Uganda military denies holding Kenyan activists Bob Njagi and Nicholas Oyoo
The statement was issued in response to a habeas corpus order requiring the UPDF to produce the activists, dead or alive, within seven days, a deadline that expired on October 21.
Kenyan activists Bob Njagi and Nicholas Oyoo, who disappeared in Uganda on October 1, 2025, are not in military custody, the Uganda People’s Defence Forces (UPDF) has said.
In a court filing dated October 21, 2025, Colonel Silas Kamanda, a Director at the UPDF’s Joint Staff Legal Services, noted that the army had conducted extensive investigations but found no record of the two Kenyans in any detention facility.
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“I, Silas Kamanda, a Colonel in the Uganda People’s Defence Forces, currently serving as a Director at the Joint Staff Legal Services for and on behalf of the Uganda People’s Defence Forces, in obedience to the writ herein, do satisfy and return that Nicholas Oyoo and Bob Njagi are not in the custody of the Uganda People’s Defence Forces,” reads the affidavit.
“We have carried out investigations and searched all relevant detention facilities and records, including lock-up registers and custody records, and found no entry relating to the said Nicholas Oyoo and Bob Njagi between October 1, 2025, to date.”
The statement was issued in response to a habeas corpus order requiring the UPDF to produce the activists, dead or alive, within seven days, a deadline that expired on October 21.
Oyoo and Njagi were reportedly abducted by four armed men, believed to be security officers, at a petrol station in Kaliro District, Eastern Uganda, while monitoring a political campaign rally for National Unity Platform presidential candidate Bobi Wine ahead of Uganda’s January 2026 elections.
Their phones were reportedly switched off following the abduction.
Bobi Wine criticised the Ugandan government, accusing it of using abductions to silence critics.
“Like it did with comrade Sam Mugumya, whom it abducted 2 months ago and remains missing to date, the shameless Museveni regime has also denied having in its custody our Kenyan comrades Bob Njagi and Nicholas Oyoo, whom it abducted in Kampala on 1st October! A regime that came to power 40 years promising to end gross human rights violations, is now blatantly engaging in even worse! We must end this impunity once and for all, fellow Ugandans!” he wrote on X.
Human rights activists have called on East African heads of state to intervene and address the rising trend of abductions in the region while safeguarding freedom of speech.
Lawyers Eron Kiiza and Kato Tumusiime filed a habeas corpus petition on October 6 seeking the immediate release of the two activists from the Chief of Defence Forces, the Chief of Defence Intelligence and Security, the Inspector General of Police and the Uganda Attorney General.
However, during a hearing on October 14, Ugandan authorities denied holding the activists. Justice Kinobe Peter then ordered the government to produce Oyoo and Njagi, dead or alive, within seven days.
But Col. Kamanda reiterated in his affidavit that the duo are not in custody and that their whereabouts remain unknown.
“We therefore confirm that the said Nicholas Oyoo and Bob Njagi are not within the custody of the Uganda People’s Defence Forces and we do not know their whereabouts,” he said.
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