Kabarega

Chwa II Kabarega, also spelled Kabalega, was born around 18 June 1853, the son of Omukama Kyebambe IV Kamurasi of Bunyoro-Kitara and Kanyange Nyamutahingurwa. He took the throne name Chwa II after Chwa I, a king whose stories had inspired him as a child. When his father died in 1869 a civil war of succession broke out, and Kabarega, still a teenager, defeated his elder brother Kabigumire and was crowned in 1869 or 1870, the 23rd Omukama of the Babiito dynasty.

His first task was to reform the army that had fought for him. He turned the royal guard, the Abarusura, from a police force into a standing army under his direct command, and organised it into regiments. The kingdom was united, and he was both head of state and commander-in-chief. He also built diplomatic ties with other states of the region.

Kabarega's kingdom stood in the way of imperial ambitions, and his resistance began in 1872 when he defeated the troops of the British explorer Sir Samuel Baker, who was acting for the Egyptian Khedive. On 1 January 1894 the British declared war on Bunyoro, and for almost five years he fought them. The arrival of Captain Frederick Lugard proved a great blow, as his forces destroyed Kabarega's armies at Muhokya, Katooke and Butanuka, but in 1895 Kabarega slipped back into Bunyoro and attacked the British near Masindi, and fought on.

On 9 April 1899 he was shot in the arm and captured with his ally Kabaka Mwanga II of Buganda by forces led by two Baganda generals who were collaborating with the British, Semei Kakungulu and Andereya Luwandagga. Both kings were taken to Kismayu and then to the Seychelles, where Mwanga died in 1903. Kabarega spent 24 years in exile, while his son Kitahimbwa was installed in his place and Bunyoro was brought into the British protectorate.

In 1923 the British allowed Kabarega to return home, but he died on 6 April at Jinja on the way, aged about 70, and was buried at Mparo, near Hoima. Critics argue that his war of resistance devastated Bunyoro, while his admirers regard him as the last great king of Bunyoro-Kitara and a hero of resistance to colonial rule. In his honour a royal order, the Most Honourable Order of Omukama Chwa II Kabalega, was founded.