Where is Sam Mugumya? Demand Ugandan Government Produce Him
The Issue
Sam Mugumya, a Ugandan political activist, poet and former political aide to jailed opposition leader Dr. Kizza Besigye, was disappeared on August 26, 2025 after men wearing Uganda People’s Defence Forces (UPDF) military uniforms seized him while he was having breakfast at a hotel in Mbarara City. A year later, his family still does not know where he is, who is holding him, or whether he is receiving the medical care he urgently needs.
Mugumya did not simply go missing. He was disappeared. Witnesses saw men in UPDF uniforms take him away. While the authorities have denied holding him, Sam was disappeared at a time when several activists and opposition leaders including Dr Kizza Besigye, Edward Ssebufu alias Eddy Mutwe, Obeid Lutaale and others are disappeared, the state denies knowledge of their whereabouts, only to produce them in courts of law later. Moreover, the state has refused to provide his family or the public a credible account of what happened or establish his whereabouts. On September 5, 2025, the High Court of Uganda intervened by issuing a writ of habeas corpus, a judicial mandate compelling the relevant authorities to produce Sam Mugumya before a judge or provide a lawful account of his detention. Despite this clear legal requirement, the state failed to offer a substantive response, with its representatives merely asserting that he was not in their custody.
In late July 2026, nearly a full year following his vanishing, a brief, surreptitiously filmed eleven-second video emerged on the internet showing Sam utilizing a mobility aid. This footage, reportedly captured within a facility at the Kasenyi camp of the Special Forces Command, the elite unit tasked with executive protection, surfaced after numerous accounts from ex-detainees corroborated his presence there. When confronted with this visual evidence, the Minister for Defence and Veteran Affairs, Kiryowa Kiwanuka, maintained the official position that the government remains unaware of his location.
Sam’s current plight follows a previous, grueling eight-year incarceration within the Ndolo Military Prison in the Democratic Republic of Congo, a detention that commenced after he was apprehended near the border. Following his eventual release in October 2022, he returned to his life of advocacy and literary expression, notably authoring the collection We Refuse to Be Victims: Poems from Prison. Having already sacrificed nearly a decade to a foreign jail, he is now subjected to the bitter injustice of being vanished within his own homeland, leaving his kin once more in a desperate vigil for any word of his safety or location.
We cannot accept this silence and uncertainty
We, the originators of this petition — Agora Centre for Research, Agather Atuhaire, Godwin Toko, Doreen Nyanjura, Eron Kiiza, Stephen Kafeero, Lillian Drabo, and others — petition His Excellency President Yoweri Kaguta Museveni, as President of Uganda and Commander-in-Chief of the UPDF, to urgently intervene and bring this matter to a lawful and humane conclusion.
We ask all Ugandans and defenders of human rights and democracy around the world to sign this petition and join us in demanding that President Museveni establish and publicly disclose Sam’s whereabouts; ensure that he is immediately produced before a competent civilian court if he is being detained, or released if there is no lawful basis for his detention; guarantee his urgent and independent medical assessment and treatment; ensure immediate access to him by his family and lawyers; comply fully with the High Court’s habeas corpus orders; and order an independent, transparent and effective investigation into his disappearance, including the circumstances surrounding his seizure and the identity and conduct of those who took him.
Sam Mugumya and his family have waited long enough. We ask you to stand with them, defend the rule of law, and sign this petition.
Your Excellency,
We, the undersigned, are citizens and persons who care about Uganda, the rule of law and the protection of fundamental human rights.
We petition Your Excellency to bring to your attention the extraordinary and deeply troubling circumstances surrounding the enforced disappearance of Sam Mugumya, a Ugandan citizen, political activist, poet and former aide to Dr. Kizza Besigye, who has now been disappeared for one year. Our duty to Uganda constrains us from remaining silent.
On August 26, 2025, Sam Mugumya was seized while having breakfast at a hotel in Mbarara City. Witnesses reported seeing armed men, including men wearing Uganda People’s Defence Forces (UPDF) military uniforms, take him away. Since that day, Sam has not been seen in public, and his family has been left without a satisfactory explanation of his whereabouts or wellbeing.
The circumstances of his disappearance are particularly disturbing because of the involvement of individuals wearing the uniform of the UPDF. This places a profound responsibility on the state to establish what happened to Sam and to account for his whereabouts.
The courts have already intervened.
On September 5, 2025, the High Court issued a writ of habeas corpus requiring the authorities to produce Sam before court or account for his detention. On September 12, 2025, the court further directed the relevant authorities to investigate the circumstances of his disappearance and report back.
Yet the central question remains unanswered: Where is Sam Mugumya?
Although the UPDF denies holding him, no official or plausible explanation has been provided regarding the whereabouts or fate of the Ugandan citizen taken by armed personnel.
In August 2026, the Minister of Defence and Veteran Affairs told Parliament that the government does not know Sam’s whereabouts.
This is an extraordinary situation. If the state did not take Sam, then it has a duty to find out who did. If state agents took him, then the state has a duty to disclose where he is and produce him before a competent court. There can be no lawful basis for a citizen to simply disappear beyond the protection of the Constitution.
Our concern has become even more urgent following the emergence of video footage showing Sam in a severely weakened physical condition. We do not need to speculate about the circumstances that produced his condition to recognise the immediate danger. If Sam is alive and in custody, he requires urgent, independent medical assessment and treatment. His family and lawyers must be allowed access to him.
Your Excellency, Uganda’s Constitution is clear.
Article 23 protects personal liberty and requires a person arrested in connection with an offence to be brought before a court within the prescribed constitutional period. Article 44 makes the right to a fair hearing and the right to habeas corpus non-derogable.
These are not privileges reserved for citizens who agree with the government. They are constitutional protections owed to every Ugandan. The law must therefore take its proper course.
If Sam Mugumya has committed an offence, charge him and produce him before a competent civilian court. If there is no lawful basis for his detention, release him immediately. If the state is not holding him, find him and establish what happened to him.
What cannot continue is a situation in which a Ugandan citizen disappears for almost a year while the authorities say they do not know where he is. The injustice is too visible to ignore, and we would be unfaithful to our devotion to Uganda if we remained silent.
The criminal justice and security systems were never created to place citizens beyond the protection of the law. When people can disappear without acknowledgment, when court orders do not produce answers, and when families cannot establish whether their loved ones are alive or safe, public confidence in the institutions of the state is inevitably damaged.
Your Excellency, you hold the offices of President of Uganda and Commander-in-Chief of the UPDF. The reports that men wearing UPDF uniforms participated in Sam’s disappearance make your intervention especially important.
We therefore respectfully petition Your Excellency to:
- Immediately establish and publicly disclose Sam Mugumya’s whereabouts.
- Order that Sam be produced before a competent civilian court if he is in custody, and that the legal basis for his detention be disclosed.
- Order Sam’s immediate and unconditional release if there is no lawful basis for his continued detention.
- Ensure that Sam receives immediate, independent medical assessment and appropriate treatment, given the serious concerns about his physical condition.
- Ensure that Sam’s family and lawyers have immediate access to him if he is in custody.
- Ensure full compliance with the High Court’s habeas corpus orders and the directions requiring an investigation into his disappearance.
- Commission an independent, transparent and effective investigation into the circumstances of Sam’s disappearance, including identifying the individuals who took him and establishing whether any state agency was involved.
- Hold accountable any person, regardless of rank or institution, found responsible for unlawfully depriving Sam of his liberty or violating his fundamental rights.
Your Excellency, this petition is not about whether one agrees with Sam Mugumya’s political views. It is about whether the Constitution protects every Ugandan.
It is about whether a citizen can disappear and the state can simply say it does not know where he is.
It is about whether a court order requiring the state to account for a missing citizen has any meaning.
And ultimately, it is about whether the rule of law remains stronger than the power of those who exercise state authority.
The law must have moral content, and its enforcement must have humanity. The Constitution must not become an empty promise when the person seeking its protection is politically inconvenient.
Sam Mugumya has been missing for almost one year. His family has waited long enough.
244
The Issue
Sam Mugumya, a Ugandan political activist, poet and former political aide to jailed opposition leader Dr. Kizza Besigye, was disappeared on August 26, 2025 after men wearing Uganda People’s Defence Forces (UPDF) military uniforms seized him while he was having breakfast at a hotel in Mbarara City. A year later, his family still does not know where he is, who is holding him, or whether he is receiving the medical care he urgently needs.
Mugumya did not simply go missing. He was disappeared. Witnesses saw men in UPDF uniforms take him away. While the authorities have denied holding him, Sam was disappeared at a time when several activists and opposition leaders including Dr Kizza Besigye, Edward Ssebufu alias Eddy Mutwe, Obeid Lutaale and others are disappeared, the state denies knowledge of their whereabouts, only to produce them in courts of law later. Moreover, the state has refused to provide his family or the public a credible account of what happened or establish his whereabouts. On September 5, 2025, the High Court of Uganda intervened by issuing a writ of habeas corpus, a judicial mandate compelling the relevant authorities to produce Sam Mugumya before a judge or provide a lawful account of his detention. Despite this clear legal requirement, the state failed to offer a substantive response, with its representatives merely asserting that he was not in their custody.
In late July 2026, nearly a full year following his vanishing, a brief, surreptitiously filmed eleven-second video emerged on the internet showing Sam utilizing a mobility aid. This footage, reportedly captured within a facility at the Kasenyi camp of the Special Forces Command, the elite unit tasked with executive protection, surfaced after numerous accounts from ex-detainees corroborated his presence there. When confronted with this visual evidence, the Minister for Defence and Veteran Affairs, Kiryowa Kiwanuka, maintained the official position that the government remains unaware of his location.
Sam’s current plight follows a previous, grueling eight-year incarceration within the Ndolo Military Prison in the Democratic Republic of Congo, a detention that commenced after he was apprehended near the border. Following his eventual release in October 2022, he returned to his life of advocacy and literary expression, notably authoring the collection We Refuse to Be Victims: Poems from Prison. Having already sacrificed nearly a decade to a foreign jail, he is now subjected to the bitter injustice of being vanished within his own homeland, leaving his kin once more in a desperate vigil for any word of his safety or location.
We cannot accept this silence and uncertainty
We, the originators of this petition — Agora Centre for Research, Agather Atuhaire, Godwin Toko, Doreen Nyanjura, Eron Kiiza, Stephen Kafeero, Lillian Drabo, and others — petition His Excellency President Yoweri Kaguta Museveni, as President of Uganda and Commander-in-Chief of the UPDF, to urgently intervene and bring this matter to a lawful and humane conclusion.
We ask all Ugandans and defenders of human rights and democracy around the world to sign this petition and join us in demanding that President Museveni establish and publicly disclose Sam’s whereabouts; ensure that he is immediately produced before a competent civilian court if he is being detained, or released if there is no lawful basis for his detention; guarantee his urgent and independent medical assessment and treatment; ensure immediate access to him by his family and lawyers; comply fully with the High Court’s habeas corpus orders; and order an independent, transparent and effective investigation into his disappearance, including the circumstances surrounding his seizure and the identity and conduct of those who took him.
Sam Mugumya and his family have waited long enough. We ask you to stand with them, defend the rule of law, and sign this petition.
Your Excellency,
We, the undersigned, are citizens and persons who care about Uganda, the rule of law and the protection of fundamental human rights.
We petition Your Excellency to bring to your attention the extraordinary and deeply troubling circumstances surrounding the enforced disappearance of Sam Mugumya, a Ugandan citizen, political activist, poet and former aide to Dr. Kizza Besigye, who has now been disappeared for one year. Our duty to Uganda constrains us from remaining silent.
On August 26, 2025, Sam Mugumya was seized while having breakfast at a hotel in Mbarara City. Witnesses reported seeing armed men, including men wearing Uganda People’s Defence Forces (UPDF) military uniforms, take him away. Since that day, Sam has not been seen in public, and his family has been left without a satisfactory explanation of his whereabouts or wellbeing.
The circumstances of his disappearance are particularly disturbing because of the involvement of individuals wearing the uniform of the UPDF. This places a profound responsibility on the state to establish what happened to Sam and to account for his whereabouts.
The courts have already intervened.
On September 5, 2025, the High Court issued a writ of habeas corpus requiring the authorities to produce Sam before court or account for his detention. On September 12, 2025, the court further directed the relevant authorities to investigate the circumstances of his disappearance and report back.
Yet the central question remains unanswered: Where is Sam Mugumya?
Although the UPDF denies holding him, no official or plausible explanation has been provided regarding the whereabouts or fate of the Ugandan citizen taken by armed personnel.
In August 2026, the Minister of Defence and Veteran Affairs told Parliament that the government does not know Sam’s whereabouts.
This is an extraordinary situation. If the state did not take Sam, then it has a duty to find out who did. If state agents took him, then the state has a duty to disclose where he is and produce him before a competent court. There can be no lawful basis for a citizen to simply disappear beyond the protection of the Constitution.
Our concern has become even more urgent following the emergence of video footage showing Sam in a severely weakened physical condition. We do not need to speculate about the circumstances that produced his condition to recognise the immediate danger. If Sam is alive and in custody, he requires urgent, independent medical assessment and treatment. His family and lawyers must be allowed access to him.
Your Excellency, Uganda’s Constitution is clear.
Article 23 protects personal liberty and requires a person arrested in connection with an offence to be brought before a court within the prescribed constitutional period. Article 44 makes the right to a fair hearing and the right to habeas corpus non-derogable.
These are not privileges reserved for citizens who agree with the government. They are constitutional protections owed to every Ugandan. The law must therefore take its proper course.
If Sam Mugumya has committed an offence, charge him and produce him before a competent civilian court. If there is no lawful basis for his detention, release him immediately. If the state is not holding him, find him and establish what happened to him.
What cannot continue is a situation in which a Ugandan citizen disappears for almost a year while the authorities say they do not know where he is. The injustice is too visible to ignore, and we would be unfaithful to our devotion to Uganda if we remained silent.
The criminal justice and security systems were never created to place citizens beyond the protection of the law. When people can disappear without acknowledgment, when court orders do not produce answers, and when families cannot establish whether their loved ones are alive or safe, public confidence in the institutions of the state is inevitably damaged.
Your Excellency, you hold the offices of President of Uganda and Commander-in-Chief of the UPDF. The reports that men wearing UPDF uniforms participated in Sam’s disappearance make your intervention especially important.
We therefore respectfully petition Your Excellency to:
- Immediately establish and publicly disclose Sam Mugumya’s whereabouts.
- Order that Sam be produced before a competent civilian court if he is in custody, and that the legal basis for his detention be disclosed.
- Order Sam’s immediate and unconditional release if there is no lawful basis for his continued detention.
- Ensure that Sam receives immediate, independent medical assessment and appropriate treatment, given the serious concerns about his physical condition.
- Ensure that Sam’s family and lawyers have immediate access to him if he is in custody.
- Ensure full compliance with the High Court’s habeas corpus orders and the directions requiring an investigation into his disappearance.
- Commission an independent, transparent and effective investigation into the circumstances of Sam’s disappearance, including identifying the individuals who took him and establishing whether any state agency was involved.
- Hold accountable any person, regardless of rank or institution, found responsible for unlawfully depriving Sam of his liberty or violating his fundamental rights.
Your Excellency, this petition is not about whether one agrees with Sam Mugumya’s political views. It is about whether the Constitution protects every Ugandan.
It is about whether a citizen can disappear and the state can simply say it does not know where he is.
It is about whether a court order requiring the state to account for a missing citizen has any meaning.
And ultimately, it is about whether the rule of law remains stronger than the power of those who exercise state authority.
The law must have moral content, and its enforcement must have humanity. The Constitution must not become an empty promise when the person seeking its protection is politically inconvenient.
Sam Mugumya has been missing for almost one year. His family has waited long enough.
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Petition created on 18 August 2026