Uganda: Hajjat Namyalo Announces Fallen Fighters' Prayers As NRM Marks Museveni's 82nd Birthday

What the report says

The Office of the National Chairman of Uganda’s ruling National Resistance Movement (NRM) plans a special prayer and commemoration ceremony on Tuesday in Kyambogo to honour fallen liberation fighters and mark President Yoweri Museveni’s 82nd birthday, according to a report by The New Light Paper distributed by AllAfrica. The announcement was made by Hajjat Hadijjah Namyalo, manager of the Office of the National Chairman, during a media briefing on Monday.

The event is scheduled to begin at 9:00 a.m. and is expected to bring together religious leaders from different denominations, surviving fighters and families of people who died during Uganda’s liberation struggle. The report says the gathering will be held at the NRM chairman’s headquarters and is intended to combine prayer, remembrance and reflection on the country’s political history.

Namyalo said the timing was meant to connect the President’s birthday with recognition of the sacrifices made during the guerrilla war that brought the NRM to power in 1986. She also framed September as a spiritually significant month for those involved. The ceremony is meant not only to remember the dead, but also to acknowledge living veterans and involve their children in preserving the history of the struggle.

More broadly, the report places the event within the NRM’s long-running emphasis on liberation history as part of Uganda’s national story. This background helps explain why the party is using the birthday marking as a wider tribute to fighters and their families.