{UAH} Amin's Rule

In the first few weeks after the 1971 coup 

d'etat, Amin set about eliminating suspected opponents in the army.  While Obote used the 1967 Detention Act to lock his opponents in prisons where they were "well treated."  Amin killed them.  Such was the fate of various high-ranking officers known or perceived to be his opponents.  There were mass killings of members of the GSU, the Special Force, Police, Prisoners and civilians.  Victims were abducted by loyal security men, put on trucks and taken to prisons like Luzira, Makindye, Mutukula, and Jinja, which had been turned into slaughterhouses.

Bodies were dumped in lakes, rivers, forests, and isolated areas.  Mass graves were dug near barracks by prisoners who were themselves eventually killed.  Traditional Kakwa rituals were resurrected.  Parts of the body, including the penis, were often cut off and ceremoniously put into the mouth of the victim.  If the victime was a tough opponent of the regime, his head was preserved and "addressed" by those in authority.

Amin consolidated his base in the army by using his own ethnic groups.  In march 1971 more than thirty Acholi/ Langi soldiers were dynamited at Makindye Barracks.  On 22 July 1971 about 150 to 500 Acholis and Langi from Simba Battalion, Mbarara, were hearded into trucks, taken to an isolated ranch, and gunned down.  On going to Israel and Europe in July 1971, Amin gave orders for the elimination of the Langi and Acholi soldiers fearing they might organize a coup.  At Mbarara soldiers from these ethnic groups were separated from the rest and taken to their deaths.  On 9 July 1971 about twenty new Acholi/Langi recruits were killed; more died the following day.  Between 10 and 14 July 1971 some fifty Acholi/ Langi soldiers were killed at Magamaga Ordnance Depot.  Further massacres of these ethnic groups occurred at military barracks at Masindi, Soroti, and Kitgum.  On 5 February 1972, about 117 soldiers and other security men of the Obote regime were mowed down as they tried to escape.

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*A positive mind is a courageous mind, without doubts and fears, using the experience and wisdom to give the best of him/herself.

 

 We must dare invent the future!
The only way of limiting the usurpation of power by
 individuals, the military or otherwise, is to put the people in charge  - Capt. Thomas. Sankara {RIP} '1949-1987

 *"Those who make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent

revolution inevitable"**…  *J.F Kennedy

 

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