{"id":22166,"date":"2026-01-14T05:13:12","date_gmt":"2026-01-14T05:13:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/africa\/22166\/"},"modified":"2026-01-14T05:13:12","modified_gmt":"2026-01-14T05:13:12","slug":"uganda-shuts-down-internet-as-museveni-seeks-to-extend-40-year-rule-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/africa\/22166\/","title":{"rendered":"Uganda shuts down internet as Museveni seeks to extend 40-year rule"},"content":{"rendered":"<p datatype=\"p\" data-qa=\"Component-Component\" class=\"e8zc9q40 css-1c6uqr6 ec74h0k1\">Ugandan authorities shut down internet access nationwide on Tuesday, two days ahead of elections in which President Yoweri Museveni has overseen a crackdown on the opposition as he seeks to extend his 40-year rule.<\/p>\n<p datatype=\"p\" data-qa=\"Component-Component\" class=\"e8zc9q40 css-1c6uqr6 ec74h0k1\">The 81-year-old leader, who once said African rulers should not overstay their time in office, was widely expected to win a seventh term on Thursday due to his total control over state and security bodies.<\/p>\n<p datatype=\"p\" data-qa=\"Component-Component\" class=\"e8zc9q40 css-1c6uqr6 ec74h0k1\">But he was taking no chances against a popular opponent, Bobi Wine, a 43-year-old singer-turned-politician, who has drawn large crowds to his rallies despite violent repression from the security forces.<\/p>\n<p datatype=\"p\" data-qa=\"Component-Component\" class=\"e8zc9q40 css-1c6uqr6 ec74h0k1\">Museveni held his final campaign rally in the capital Kampala on Tuesday, in a grand show most international media were blocked from covering.<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" alt=\"Supporters of Uganda\u2019s President Yoweri Museveni at a campaign rally on Tuesday. Photo: AFP\" data-qa=\"BaseImage-handleRenderImage-StyledImage\" class=\"e1gf69pb2 css-6ikqhs e445x7d0\" loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/africa\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/2a4ee1c7-afe1-40d4-af79-5174a81338a5_c7092b25.jpg\" title=\"Supporters of Uganda\u2019s President Yoweri Museveni at a campaign rally on Tuesday. Photo: AFP\"\/>Supporters of Uganda\u2019s President Yoweri Museveni at a campaign rally on Tuesday. Photo: AFP<\/p>\n<p datatype=\"p\" data-qa=\"Component-Component\" class=\"e8zc9q40 css-1c6uqr6 ec74h0k1\">Thousands walked to Kololo National Ceremonial Gardens for the rally, many telling Agence France-Presse they had been bussed into the capital for the event and given free food.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Ugandan authorities shut down internet access nationwide on Tuesday, two days ahead of elections in which President Yoweri&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":22092,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[58],"tags":[13705,2563,463,1120,80,3187,13703,1202,13704,2555,13702,152,153,410,2564],"class_list":{"0":"post-22166","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-uganda","8":"tag-agence-france-presse","9":"tag-bobi-wine","10":"tag-internet","11":"tag-kampala","12":"tag-kenya","13":"tag-kizza-besigye","14":"tag-kololo-national-ceremonial-gardens","15":"tag-museveni","16":"tag-netblocks","17":"tag-opposition","18":"tag-special-forces-command","19":"tag-tanzania","20":"tag-uganda","21":"tag-uganda-communications-commission","22":"tag-yoweri-museveni"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22166","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=22166"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22166\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/22092"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=22166"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=22166"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=22166"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}