Andrew Kayiira

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Andrew Kayiira

Andrew Lutaakome Kayiira (January 30, 1945 - March 9, 1987), M.A, Ph.D, was the Leader of the Uganda Freedom Movement (UFM), a guerrilla organization that fought the governments of Milton Obote and Tito Okello between 1980 and 1986. Andrew Kayiira and the UFM were often seen as a rival to the National Resistance Movement led by Yoweri Museveni which was also fighting a guerrilla war against the Obote and Okello governments. When the National Resistance Movement took power in 1986, Andrew Kayiira was appointed Minister for Energy by Yoweri Museveni. Later that year Kayiira was arrested for treason but later released. He was murdered by unknown gunmen on March 9, 1987.

[edit] Education and early career

Kayiira attended Namilyango College, and was addmited to the Faculty of Mathematics at Makerere University but instead he chose to work for the government Civil Service in the Prisons Department where he rose to Assistant Superintendent. He later won a scholarship to the United Kingdom where he obtained a Diploma in Criminal Justice. He then moved to the United States to attend the University of Southern Illinois, where he gained a Bachelor of Science Degree in Criminal Justice and an M.A. and a Ph.D. in Criminal Justice from the State University of New York.

The regime of Idi Amin was in full swing at the time Kayiira completed his studies, so he remained in the USA, where he took up the position of Assistant Professor of Criminal Justice at the University of New Haven in Connecticut. It was at this time that he began active politics, founding the Uganda Freedom Union (UFU) with other Ugandans living in the United States - including Godfrey Binaisa.

After the overthrow of Idi Amin in 1979, Andrew Kayiira returned to Uganda as a member of the quasi-legislative National Consultative Council under President Yusuf Lule.