Ugandan minister survives assassination attempt, wounded woman

The Office of the Police Spokesperson confirmed to Efe, that the Ugandan Minister of Labor and Transport, General Edward Katumba Wamala, survived an assassination attempt this morning in which one of his daughters and her personal driver were killed.

According to eyewitnesses, shortly after Wamala left his home in north Kampala, the Ugandan capital, several motorbikes with heavily armed men approached his off-road vehicle and fired on the vehicle.

Although Wamala was injured and taken to a hospital in the Ugandan capital, MP Chris Baryomonsi assured the media that he was “stable” and “out of danger”.

“Our colleague Wamala was killed, his driver (Haruma Kayondo) and his daughter (Brenda Katoomba) died. [?]. “We hope the souls of the dead may rest in peace,” Ugandan parliament spokesman Jacob Olania said shortly afterwards on his Twitter account.

In an official statement and on his Twitter account, Ugandan President Yoweri Kaguta Museveni described the shooters – still unknown – as “pigs” and assured that his government would “defeat these criminals”.

“We already have evidence of the killers. (…) Wamala’s bodyguard should not have been shooting in the air, but against these terrorists,” the president added.

Prior to heading the Ministry of Labor and Transport at the end of 2019, Wamala emerged as one of Uganda’s oldest military personnel and held the positions of Chief of Defense Forces and Inspector General of Police.

In March 2017, Ugandan police spokesman Andrew Felix Kwesi and two of his bodyguards were killed during a similar attack on the outskirts of their home after a group of armed motorists attacked their car.