Samuel Olara :
I think one of Obote’s biggest mistakes was that he learnt very little from 1971. After Amin’s fall, many of the fighting forces made it clear that they had not fought simply to restore Obote to power. At Moshi, Obote had political influence, but he did not have an army of his own strong enough to impose his preferred outcome, so he had to accept the coalition arrangement.
Yet once he came back to Uganda, instead of first helping to build a disciplined, unified and genuinely national army, he concentrated on returning to power and pushed towards the 1980 elections. That was a serious strategic mistake. Uganda’s military remained divided, politicised and factional. In the end, Obote regained the presidency but never established a secure military foundation for his government.
The irony is striking: in 1971 he lost power through the army, in 1979 his lack of an army limited his ability to dictate the post-Amin settlement, and in 1985 he was again removed by the army. In my view, Obote understood the importance of capturing political power, but he never fully learnt that in the Uganda of that period, political power could not be secure without first resolving the military question.
Museveni understood very well.
2026-09-02 23:22:20