President Yoweri Museveni of Uganda, one of Africa’s most dominant leaders, won re-election on Saturday to extend his four decades in power.
The victory was widely expected, given the president’s many terms in office and the muscle of the ruling National Resistance Movement party, which controls state institutions at virtually every level.
Mr. Museveni, 81, is one of a small handful of African leaders who have ruled for more than 40 years, but he argued during the campaign that his tenure has brought stability and economic growth to Uganda that should not be risked.
Thursday’s election was held amid an internet shutdown that deprived the population of access to online news, email, social media and the messaging apps on which many depend. The authorities ordered the blackouts, citing security concerns, but some voters said it emphasized their powerlessness.
On Election Day, Mr. Museveni said he expected 80 percent of the vote, but the electoral commission declared him the winner with nearly 72 percent.
His nearest challenger, Bobi Wine, had amassed a following as a pop star — not least among young voters in cities such as the capital, Kampala — before he turned to politics. Mr. Wine made several appearances on the campaign trail in a flak jacket and red beret or combat helmet to emphasize his claims that Uganda was effectively a militarized state — something the government denied.
“Uganda is a political security state,” Adonia Ayebare, Uganda’s ambassador to the United Nations, said in an interview. “The security establishment is always nervous about stability.” But he said that the president was “laser focused” on the concerns of young people in cities and determined to put in place programs to improve their economic prospects. Uganda has one of the youngest populations in the world and, like many African countries, there are few jobs in the formal sector.
Mr. Wine, whose real name is Robert Kyagulanyi, gained nearly a quarter of the votes cast, according to the electoral commission chairman, Simon Byabakama.
Mr. Wine was arrested and beaten several times during the last election, in 2021, and dozens of people were killed.
“Elections in Uganda today are a military operation. I don’t think it’s a civic activity,” said Godber Tumushabe, a policy analyst and lawyer. “When state resources are deployed then it is inevitable that its candidates will win.”
Mr. Wine’s whereabouts on Saturday were in dispute. The police spokesman, Rusoke Kituuma, said at a news conference that he was at his home outside the capital, but that his property was “restricted because we don’t want it to be used as a springboard for inciting violence.”
Mr. Wine’s party, the National Unity Platform, issued a statement late Friday saying that he had been abducted by the security forces, but later deleted the post from X. On Saturday, before the announcement of the election results, Mr. Wine issued a video statement on the platform, in which he said that he had managed to “use my skills and escape my house.”
The video was shot against the background of a Ugandan flag but provided no evidence of Mr. Wine’s location. He described the forthcoming election results as “fake” and urged his supporters to take to the streets in protest.
“We want to call upon the people of Uganda to nonviolently protest and reject any effort to subvert their voice and demand that the rightful results are announced,” Mr. Wine said.
While the video accumulated more than 130,000 views online, it appeared unlikely that it would circulate widely in Uganda, given the internet blackout. The authorities have deployed thousands of army soldiers and the police around Kampala in an effort to dissuade demonstrators. The city’s streets have been virtually deserted since the election.
Mr. Museveni’s story is integral to the history of independence of Uganda and the region. He fled the country during the reign of the dictator Idi Amin in the 1970s to the city of Dar es Salaam in Tanzania, which at that time was ruled by Julius Nyerere, a socialist and one of the continent’s leading intellectuals. There, Mr. Museveni studied and formed a fledging rebel group.
He returned to Uganda after Mr. Amin was ousted, but after losing a highly disputed election in 1980, went into hiding, organizing a rebellion that fought its way to power in 1986. That war further damaged a country already brutalized by Mr. Amin’s regime.
It then took years for Mr. Museveni’s government to consolidate power, particularly over the north where his troops fought to put down another rebellion that had erupted. The fighting had a devastating impact on the civilian population.
Today, the country has troops in the east of the Democratic Republic of Congo as well as in South Sudan, both of which are significant markets for Uganda’s economy. It is also the largest contributor of peacekeeping troops to Somalia.
Given Mr. Museveni’s age, however, many Ugandans are focused on who might one day succeed him as president. Mr. Museveni’s son, Gen. Muhoozi Kainerugaba, who heads the country’s armed forces, is viewed as the most likely successor.
Matthew Mpoke Bigg is a London-based reporter on the Live team at The Times, which covers breaking and developing news.
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