President Yoweri Kaguta Museveni has received the Katonga Medal which is the highest medal in the Uganda People’s Defence Forces (UPDF).
The medal was awarded to Museveni during the 42nd anniversary of Tarehe Sita, marked every February 6, in honour of the beginning of the 1981-86 National Resistance Army (NRA) guerrilla war with an attack on Kabamba military barracks.
The highest and most rarely awarded military medal is given to individuals who have exhibited extra-ordinary instances of heroism in the army.
The instances referred to are those that involve voluntary acceptance of additional danger beyond the call of duty and risk of life. The President (or where the President is the beneficiary, the Chief Justice) shall be the only person to make presentations of The Order of Katonga.
The Order may be awarded to an individual more than once on different occasions; and apart from order awarded on the very first time, a bar attached to the ribbon by which the order is suspended shall record each subsequent award Order of Katonga derived the name from a very decisive battle that signified the final victory of the NRA as it fought to capture power.
NRA struggle ended, having crossed River Katonga.
Every time it is presented, the citation clearly indicates the reasons for the award. While reading the citation at the 42nd Tarehe Sita anniversary in Mbarara district on Monday, Maj Gen George Igumba said Museveni’s track record is unmeasurable.
“He is a nationalist, democrat, pan Africanist, and statesman. He consistently struggled against tyranny and misrule of the country since his school days in tbe 1960s,” said Gen Igumba.
“Through the 1970s, he struggled and formed Front for National Salvation (FRONASA) in the anti Amin struggle. FRONASA rose to about 10,000 combatants and played a decisive role in crossing of the Kagera river defeating the Uganda army then in 1979,” he added.
In 1980, Museveni formed the Uganda Patriotic Movement (UPM), to take part in the the elections. “The activists would later be the firm foundation for the people’s struggle in the 1980s.”
Museveni led the NRA in the 1981 – 86 war that ushered National Resistance Movement (NRM) into power.
The Katonga Medal was presented to President Museveni by the Chief Justice, Alphonse Owiny Dollo.
The second highest medal in the Ugandan military, the Kabalega medal was awarded to three Generals that included; the coordinator for the Operation Wealth Creation, Gen Salim Saleh, and Gen Ivan Koreta who are both retired.
