When Obote Unknowingly Made Museveni: The Untold Dar-es-Salaam Backdoor Entry

Uganda Today: When Obote Unknowingly Made Museveni: The Untold Dar-es-Salaam Backdoor Entry

By Uganda Today Reporter

In the complex tapestry of Uganda’s post-independence politics, one peculiar incident from the 1960s stands out — how President Apollo Milton Obote, perhaps unknowingly, paved the academic path for a man who would later dethrone his regime and dominate Uganda’s politics for over four decades.

According to credible sources from that era, President Obote personally intervened to help a young Yoweri Tibuhaburwa Museveni gain admission into university, after his application to Makerere University was rejected over a critical requirement — proof of his Ugandan citizenship through his father’s graduated tax tickets.

Citizenship, Requirements, and a Presidential Note

During those years, admission to Uganda’s premier institution, Makerere University, required an applicant to present ten graduated tax tickets belonging to their father. These tickets served as proof of both citizenship and local residency. Without them, one’s eligibility would be nullified — regardless of their academic performance.

Yoweri Museveni, then an ambitious youth from western Uganda, reportedly failed to provide the required tax documentation. But his political ties to the Uganda People’s Congress (UPC) would soon open a backdoor.

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As the story goes, Annas Kinyiri, then acting Chairman of the Central Scholarship Committee, received a confidential note directly from President Obote. In it, Obote pleaded with the committee to consider Museveni for admission, writing:

“I want him to join Makerere University because he is one of my UPC youth wingers who qualifies but he cannot meet the requirement of 10 graduated tax tickets.”

The request was extraordinary — not merely because of its origin, but because it sought to waive a key requirement used to assess nationality and eligibility. While the scholarship committee deliberated over the unusual request, the decision was ultimately made not to admit Museveni to Makerere under those contested circumstances.

The Dar-es-Salaam Option

Undeterred, Obote reportedly used his influence to redirect Museveni’s academic journey to the University of Dar-es-Salaam in Tanzania, a Pan-Africanist hub at the time that welcomed students from across the continent with fewer bureaucratic hurdles. It was at Dar that Museveni would be introduced to radical politics, revolutionary thought, and Marxist literature — laying the ideological foundation for the armed struggles that would define his early life.

In retrospect, many observers say that Obote’s intervention — intended to help a loyal youth winger — inadvertently shaped the trajectory of a future rival.

The Irony of History

In 1980, following the bitterly contested general elections, Museveni took up arms against the very system Obote had reinstated after years in exile. Just six years later, in 1986, Museveni’s National Resistance Army (NRA) ousted the Obote-backed government of Tito Okello Lutwa, ushering in a new era of leadership that persists to this day.

Whether Obote foresaw the long-term consequences of aiding Museveni remains a subject of political speculation. But the anecdote underscores a recurring theme in Uganda’s history — how alliances forged in youth often evolve into rivalries that shape the destiny of a nation.

#UgandanHistory #MuseveniRise #OboteLegacy #DarEsSalaamUniversity #UPC #MakerereUniversity #YoweriMuseveni #UgandaPolitics #PresidentialIrony

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