NEWS

Nairobi, Kenya | AFP | Almost 2,000 assault rifles plus grenade launchers and heavy machine guns were seized by an Australian warship, the navy said Monday, part of international efforts to police the seas off Somalia. Sailors from Australia’s HMAS Darwin boarded the fishing boat that was “headed towards the …

Johannesburg, South Africa | AFP | Barclays Africa Group Limited (BAGL) on Tuesday said it was committed to the continent after an earlier announcement by its British parent to gradually reduce its majority stake in the unit. “Our destiny is Africa,” said Maria Ramos, BAGL chief executive, at a press …

President Yoweri Museveni Thursday received the election petition challenging his re-election. In two tweets, Museveni shared photographs on social media about the brief meeting with candidate Amama Mbabazi’s lawyers Severino Twinobusingye and Akampurira in which he acknowledged receipt of the petition filed on March 1. “I received a petition from lawyers …

Development projects that pay greater attention to social accountability can improve citizen-state relations and trust in Uganda and other fragile countries, according to new research by peacebuilding organisation, International Alert. The report, titled Making social accountability work: Promoting peaceful development in Uganda, evaluates two large-scale development projects undertaken in Uganda …

Kampala, Uganda | AFP | Saturday 2/20/2016 Uganda’s top opposition leader Kizza Besigye said poll results Saturday handing President Yoweri Museveni a fifth term should be rejected, in a statement issued while under house arrest surrounded by dozens of police. “The results of the presidential elections must be rejected,” Besigye’s …

Uganda Communications Commission UCC has finally come out to explain the very poor internet access that hit the country from midnight to the start of polling day 7.00am February 18 – and later. They switched it off, they said. Many people found it difficult to access social media, especially Facebook, …

A team of 10 members from the Inter-Governmental Authority on Development (IGAD) have been deployed in the south-central Ugandan districts of Kampala, Wakiso and Mukono to observe the general election scheduled for Feb.18. IGAD member states include; Djibouti, Ethiopia, Kenya, Somalia, South Sudan and Uganda. Speaking to the media on …

The Electoral Commission (EC) has dispatched election materials including ballot papers from the commission’s warehouse in Banda ahead of presidential and parliamentary elections scheduled for Thursday Feb.18. The EC chairman Eng. Badru Kiggundu told journalists that phones and cameras are not allowed in the precincts of polling stations. He said …

Kampala, Uganda | AFP | Uganda’s army said it had taken custody of a top Lord’s Resistance Army rebel captured in Central African Republic, and would transport him home. Okot George Odek, once one of LRA supremo Joseph Kony’s most trusted aides, was held by Seleka rebels in CAR who …

Bangui, Central African Republic | AFP | Monday – A rebel group in the Central African Republic has captured and handed over to US forces a commander of the infamous Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA), one of its leaders said Monday. “Our forces captured the commander ‘Sam’ at the weekend at …