Idi Amin

President of Uganda (1971-1979)

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Lived 1925–2003, aged 78

PoliticiansPolitician

Wikipedia
102 languages
Cross-language footprint
Era
1925–2003
Aged 78
Known for
General Idi Amin Dada
1974

Summary

Updated 2026-09-07

Uganda's third president ruled for eight years after seizing power in a 1971 coup, presiding over a regime that international observers estimate killed between 100,000 and 500,000 people through political repression and extrajudicial killings.

Biography

About

Amin joined the British Colonial Army as a cook in 1946, rising to lieutenant through actions against Somali rebels and the Mau Mau Uprising in Kenya. After Uganda's 1962 independence he became army commander, then overthrew president Milton Obote in 1971 when he learned Obote planned to arrest him for misappropriating army funds. His presidency saw him shift from pro-Western backing to Soviet support, expel Uganda's Asian population in 1972, and briefly chair the Organisation of African Unity in 1975. His 1978 attempt to annex Tanzania's Kagera Region prompted an invasion that captured Kampal…

Voice

In their own words

Sourced, dated quotes from Idi Amin

Idi Amin

said12 Jan 1976

Politics is like boxing — you try to knock out your opponents.

— Interview, African summit talks, Angola, January 1976. Reported p.A8, Palm Beach Post, January 12, 1976.

Idi Amin

said1974

Sometimes people mistake the way I talk for what I am thinking. I never had any formal education—not even a nursery school certificate. But sometimes I know more than Ph.

— Appears in Barbet Schroeder (1974), General Idi Amin Dada: A Self Portrait.

via Wikiquote · CC BY-SA

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