Key Facts

• At least a dozen Ugandan generals and senior officers have been arrested in the past 15 months under army chief Gen Muhoozi Kainerugaba.
• Kainerugaba, 52, is Museveni’s son and is widely seen as a possible successor to the president, who has ruled Uganda for four decades.
• Kainerugaba threatened Vice-President Jessica Alupo with dismissal and possible arrest, and suggested he should take her position.
• Uganda’s ruling National Resistance Movement said claims that its leadership rejected a proposal to back Kainerugaba as the next president were “completely false.”
• A party leadership meeting on 10 November ended without agreement on positioning Kainerugaba as Museveni’s successor, according to accounts from party sources cited by AFP.
• Former deputy army chief Lt Gen Peter Elwelu was detained on 2 November over allegations that he plotted to destabilise the eastern Teso region.
• Kainerugaba accused Elwelu of treachery and said on X that he had stripped him of his three-star rank and demoted him.
• Political scientist Gerald Bareebe said some detained officers were believed not to support Kainerugaba’s presidential ambitions; others view the arrests as an anti-corruption effort.