The Independent Uganda: You get the Truth we Pay the Price
Kampala, Uganda | URN | The Government of Uganda has officially nominated veteran diplomat and former United Nations Under-Secretary-General Ambassador Olara Otunnu for the position of Secretary-General of the United Nations, describing him as a distinguished international civil servant with more than four decades of experience in diplomacy, peacebuilding and global governance.
In a press statement issued by Bagiire Vincent Waiswa, the Permanent Secretary Ministry of Foreign Affairs on Sunday July 26, 2026, the government said Otunnu’s experience at the highest levels of the UN system, national government, academia and civil society makes him well suited to lead the world body when the term of the current Secretary-General, António Guterres, expires this December 31.
Otunnu served as the first UN Special Representative of the Secretary-General for Children and Armed Conflict from 1998 to 2005 at the rank of Under-Secretary-General. During his tenure under Secretary-General Kofi Annan, he was among the highest-ranking African officials in the UN Secretariat, second only to Annan himself in the organization’s executive leadership. The government says he transformed the newly established office into one of the UN’s most influential mandates by placing the protection of children affected by armed conflict firmly on the agenda of the Security Council.
His tenure also saw the creation of the Monitoring and Reporting Mechanism on grave violations against children in armed conflict under UN Security Council Resolution 1612 (2005), a framework that continues to guide international efforts to protect children in conflict zones.
Before joining the UN Secretariat, Otunnu served as Uganda’s Ambassador and Permanent Representative to the United Nations between 1980 and 1985. In December 1981, while serving as President of the UN Security Council, he introduced the informal straw-balloting procedure for selecting the UN Secretary-General, a process that later became known as the “Otunnu Formula” and has since been used in every Secretary-General selection.
At the national level, Otunnu served as Uganda’s Minister of Foreign Affairs between 1985 and 1986 and was a member of the Uganda National Consultative Council during the country’s transition following the fall of Idi Amin.
Following the completion of his UN assignment in 2005, Otunnu continued his work in international peace and policy. He had earlier served as President of the International Peace Academy, now the International Peace Institute, from 1990 to 1998, and later held academic appointments at Albany Law School, the American University in Paris and the Institut Français des Relations Internationales. In recent years, he has co-led the Roco Paco peacebuilding initiative alongside retired Chief Justice Alfonse Owiny-Dollo to promote reconciliation in northern Uganda.
The government noted that Otunnu has received several international recognitions for his work, including the Sydney Peace Prize, the German Africa Prize and the Harvard Law School Alumni Association Award. It added that his combined experience in the UN Secretariat, Security Council, national government and grassroots peacebuilding uniquely qualifies him to lead the organization during a period of growing global challenges.
Uganda has called on all UN member states to support Otunnu’s candidature. He becomes the seventh candidate in the race to succeed Guterres. The selection process has already featured public dialogues with candidates, while the Security Council is expected to begin a series of confidential straw polls before recommending one candidate to the General Assembly for appointment.
Beyond his international accomplishments, Ambassador Olara Otunnu has had a distinguished career in Uganda’s public life. Born in Gulu District in northern Uganda, he studied law at Makerere where he was Guiold President before fleeing Idi Amin and joinng Oxford University, graduating with a Bachelor of Arts in Jurisprudence, before earning a Master of Laws (LL.M.) from Harvard Law School.
After years in international service, Otunnu returned to Uganda and joined active politics, becoming president of the Uganda People’s Congress (UPC) in 2010. He contested the 2011 presidential election on the UPC ticket, campaigning on constitutionalism, national reconciliation, good governance and economic transformation. Although unsuccessful, his candidature marked a significant attempt to revive the country’s oldest political party and reintroduce issue-based politics in Uganda’s democracy.
GRIEVING MY FALLEN LOVED ONES – UN APOLOGETIC. FROM THE HEART!
The UN is a body of nations, and nations are made up of people. In choosing the next Secretary-General, member states must perform strict due diligence on all contenders.
I come from Uganda, a nation in East Africa and the Congo Basin, where the region continues to burn and the suffering of its people is often ignored or misunderstood. Today, many parts of Africa remain under severe political and civil strife. The nomination of Olara Otunnu to lead the global body cannot be evaluated in a vacuum; it must be viewed directly within the context of his role in the political violence that gripped Uganda in 1985–1986, and the wider history of instability sweeping through the Congo Basin, Sudan, and Somalia.
To truly understand Uganda, you must look at the post-Idi Amin era, which was dominated by factional fighting among exiled groups who seized power. Olara Otunnu was a central part of that faction. He was the brains behind the July 1985 military coup that overthrew the elected government of Dr Milton Obote. It was replaced by a military junta known as “the Okellos,” led by two of Otunnu’s uncles, Tito and Bazilio Okello. Otunnu immediately served as the Junta’s Minister of Foreign Affairs from 1985 to 1986, acting as the international diplomatic face of the regime while citizens were terrorised at home.
The junta held power for only six months, but that period was Uganda’s darkest hour. Thousands lost their lives, including members of my own family. My hometown of Jinja became a ghost city. During this reign of terror, Okello’s soldiers beat my father-in-law to death in front of his three-year-old son. Because of the raging civil war, I was stranded in Addis Ababa and could not even return to bury my loved ones. Months later, after Yoweri Museveni’s NRA toppled the junta, I finally went home to bury my father-in-law. I took that traumatised three-year-old boy back with me to safety in Addis Ababa. Today, against all odds, that boy is one of Uganda’s leading doctors.
It is entirely unfit to appoint a person who has played a significant role in regimes and conflicts that led to the mass loss of innocent civilian lives to a role built on global peace and human rights. The international community has made this mistake before, to its lasting shame. The world deeply regretted its appointment of Kurt Waldheim to this exact post after his hidden Nazi record and complicity in wartime atrocities surfaced later in his career.
The UN and Uganda government may love Olara Otunnu, but my family and thousands of grieving Ugandans do not share that love. The world must look past the diplomatic veneer, perform true due diligence, and see the coup plotter underneath.
Otunnu is clever served at the UN etc…
In 1985-86, when the Okello military junta ruled Uganda, and Otunnu was the Foreign Minister, I was serving at Uganda’s Embassy in Addis Ababa. There was an international outcry, news reports out of Uganda, reported that the junta was killing children in Luwero triangle. Reports said the army would find children playing football in a field, open fire and kill all of them. I was confrontend by diplomatic community in Addis Ababa to explain why my government was killing children. I had no words.
Ugandans need to know this. The majority of you were not even born at the time. President Museveni was in the bush at the time fighting.