Uganda - Modern Orders, Decorations & Medals

[James Hoard]

Herewith an extract from the regulations on th modern orders, decorations and medals of Uganda instituted in February 2001.

TITLES of HONOURS, THEIR DESCRIPTION AND INCIDENTS

1 PART I - CIVILIAN DECORATIONS AND MEDALS

1 The Most Excellent Order of the Pearl of Africa

Grand Master - awarded to Heads of State and Heads of Government.

2 The Excellent Order of the Pearl of Africa

Grand Commander - reserved for the spouses of Heads of State, Vice Presidents, Crown Princes and Princesses.

3 The Distinguished Order of the Nile [Classes I-V]

Five classes - awarded to those who have distinguished themselves in productive research, economic, social and cultural enterprises.

4 The Distinguished Order of the Crested Crane [Classes I-V]

Five classes - awarded to people who have distinguished themselves in leadership and service, both public and private.

5 The National Independence Medal

Awarded to all civilian activists who championed and contributed significantly in the struggle for independence and those who have continued to protect the independence of Uganda.

6 The Nalubaale Medal

Awarded to all civilian activists who have contributed towards the political development of Uganda either through armed struggle or civil disobedience and otherwise right from colonial times to date.

Part II - MILITARY DECORATIONS AND MEDALS

7 The Order of Katonga

(1) The highest and most rarely awarded military decoration for individual extra-ordinary instances of heroism in the army.

(2) The instances referred to are those that involve voluntary acceptance of additional danger beyond the call of duty and risk of life.

(3) The President (or where the President is the beneficiary, the Chief Justice) shall be the only person to make presentations of The Order of Katonga, and every time it is presented, the citation shall clearly indicate the reasons for the award. (4) The Order may be awarded to an individual more than once on different occasions; and apart from order awarded on the very first time, a bar attached to the ribbon by which the order is suspended shall record each subsequent award.

8 The Kabalega Star (classes I - III)

(1) The second highest military decoration with three classes.

(2) The award shall be for conspicuous gallantry that does not justify the award of The Order of Katonga but bordering with the qualification for the award of the Order of Katonga.

9 The Rwenzori Star (classes I - III)

(1) The third highest military decoration of the army with three classes.

(2) The decoration shall be awarded for distinguished or exemplary military service, which shall include exceptionally meritorious service or great responsibility in military service.

(3) Under exceptional circumstances and with the approval of the President, the Rwenzori Star maybe awarded to persons other than members of the military.

10 The Masaba Star

(1) The fourth highest military decoration.

(2) Awarded to a person under the same circumstances described in the award of the Kabalega Medal, but where gallantry is not as conspicuous as in the Kabalega Medal.

10 The Damu Medal:

(1) Awarded to any member of the military who was or is wounded in action against the enemy; With an opposing armed or hostile force of a foreign country; While serving with friendly foreign forces engaged in armed conflict against an opposing force in which Uganda is not a belligerent party; As a result on an act of any such enemy or opposing armed force; As a result of any military operations while serving outside the territory of Uganda as a party of a peace- keeping force; As a result of terrorist attacks against Uganda; As a result of injury by the enemy while taken as prisoner of war; As a result of a military operation during the liberation struggles.

(2) All officers' men and women killed in action during the liberation struggles shall qualify for the Damu Medal.

12. Luwero Triangle Medal

(1) The Luwero Triangle Medal is used as the climax of the armed struggles.

(2) Awarded to any officer man and woman who joined armed struggle against dictatorships in Uganda.

(3) Civilians who operated closely with the armed freedom fighters during struggles against dictatorships shall qualify for the award of this Medal.

13 The Kyoga Medal

(1) Awarded to officers men and women of the army who have gallantry fought and defeated insurgencies in different parts of Uganda.

PART III - MISCELLANEOUS PROVISIONS

1.Whenever a title of honour is presented to a person, the citation shall clearly indicate the reasons for the award of the tile of honour.

2.Except for the Order of the Katonga, the President may delegate the presentation of any title of honour to any other person.

3.Various classes of each award shall have the same design and shape clearly defined and gazetted, provided each class is clearly indicated.

4.Any title of honour may be awarded to an individual more than once; and apart from the title of honour awarded the first time, a bar attached to the ribbon by which the title of honour is suspend shall record each subsequent award.

5. (1) Any title of honour maybe posthumously awarded to a member of the family of the deceased in accordance with the law of succession and inheritance of Uganda.

(2) In any case where there is conflict as to who should receive the title of honour, the family shall advise the committee on the appropriate person to receive the title of honour.

Cheers,

James

[NPGilbert]

Morning James

Thank you for sharing this information. Very comprehensive. You don't by chance have images to share on the medals you have described.

Regards

Norman :cheers:

[IVB]

Thank you, James, for these hard-to-find regulations!

Regards, IVB.

[IVB]

The Most Excellent Order of the Pearl of Africa:

[IVB]

The Order of Katonga:

[SAMedals]

Morning James

Thank you for sharing this information. Very comprehensive. You don't by chance have images to share on the medals you have described.

Regards

Norman

Hi Norman,

Here is an Image of the Damu Medal - Cheers - Gary

[Ulsterman]

Cool-

I got the Luwero Triangle medal-given to veterans (civil and military) who fought against Ugandas' dictators (esp. Idi Amin) in a very nasty place in Africa.

The ribbon has blue on the edges (this one is for photo purposes only).

Looking on the net one can see that there have been complaints about deserving veterans not receiving their medals in timely fashion.

Edited January 31, 2009 by Ulsterman

[NPGilbert]

Morning Gary and Ulsterman

Thanks for the images. Luckily Uganda is not such a nasty place anymore. I have quite fond memories of my time there. Unfortunitely I could not find any medals of Uganda while visiting. Only found a Africa Star of WWII at a ridiculously high price.

Regards

Norman :cheers:

[heusy68]

I got the Luwero Triangle medal-given to veterans (civil and military) who fought against Ugandas' dictators (esp. Idi Amin) in a very nasty place in Africa.

The ribbon has blue on the edges (this one is for photo purposes only).

Looking on the net one can see that there have been complaints about deserving veterans not receiving their medals in timely fashion.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->

Hello ,here is a picture of the Luwero Triangle Medal whith what I believe is ( 99 % sure ) its correct ribbon.The ribbon is from Uganda ( 100 % sure ),refering to Prieto site,but on the site of Prieto there is lots of small mistake.Anyway he do a great job.

Uganda has used some ribbon coming from other countries ( supplied by Spink ) to spare money.

Order of Victory has same ribbon like Order of Bhutan

Police Distinguished Service from Amin Dada era has same ribbon Order of the Star of Sarawak (1973-88)

Malubale Medal has same ribbon as Brazil WW I War Cross.

Anyway all Uganda Medal from the Post Amin time (with their ribbon) are not easy to get and Amin era medal are becoming scarce on market nowdays.

In the recently published book Order of Knighhood by Burkes Peerage there is an excellent picture of the Order of the Pearl of Africa.

Emmanuel

[NPGilbert]

Morning Emmanuel

Thank you for sharing that interesting insight with regard to the medal ribbons. Definitely something to take note off when obtaining and researching the country's medals. Agreed a big challenge to get hold of the medals.

Regards

Norman :cheers:

[heusy68]

The Most Excellent Order of the Pearl of Africa:

Here is a picture from Order of the Pearl of Africa ( Uganda ).

Courtesy of Spink.

Emmanuel

[heusy68]

Here is Uganda Nalubale Medal whith what I believe is its original ribbon ( I'am 99 % sure ).

Emmanuel

[Ulsterman]

The one triangle ribbon I have seen on-line is orange with blue stripes at the edge. It's on a dealers' site though.

[heusy68]

The one triangle ribbon I have seen on-line is orange with blue stripes at the edge. It's on a dealers' site though.

What do you mean ? Because if it is on the site of a dealer it MUST be right,and I must be wrong ?

emedals , Barry Turk has this medal on its site with an orange with darker stripes ribbon (ref IO272).

But guess what lots of dealers know few about medals but what they KNOW is that it is always difficult to sell a medal without ribbon,so they put any loose ribbon that cannot be "clearly indentify" on it.

Don't you know ?

Also believe me Barry Turk don't care at all of so exotic stuff.

There is a good web site for ribbon,the one of Mr Prieto,there is a few mistake but he do a great job.

Actually orange ribbon with dark bleu stripes is the ribbon for Rwanda Medal of service and from Pattiala Royal Household Medal.

Actually for Rwanda there cannot be any mistake,as the medal was manufactured by Arthus Bertrand and also because I took hours to copy and make some sketches of ribbons colours (from their ribbon books),just to keep records of ribbons of medals and orders that come never or almost never on market.

Emmanuel

[Ulsterman]

No, not doubting you at all, merely mentioning a factoid (note the use of the word"though", implying less than full confidence in a stated fact). The medal for sale is in the UK.

.........as an aside, this is reminiscent of my favorite topic in African medals-"what ribbons did the Ethiopian Derg use" (I think I now know)? Medal-Med... and I disagree, as genteel folk do, but neither of us know exactly.

Edited February 5, 2009 by Ulsterman

[heusy68]

No, not doubting you at all, merely mentioning a factoid (note the use of the word"though", implying less than full confidence in a stated fact). The medal for sale is in the UK.

.........as an aside, this is reminiscent of my favorite topic in African medals-"what ribbons did the Ethiopian Derg use" (I think I now know)? Medal-Med... and I disagree, as genteel folk do, but neither of us know exactly.

I agree

Concerning Derg regime ribbon,I have to say that we will almost never be 100 % sure of which ribbon is correct with which medal.

The Civil Long Service,Police Long Service,Wound Medal we know,but others are still a little bit confuse.

Also some didn't liked the official ribbon,like those turkish servicemen who replaced the ribbon of their Korea War UN Medal in turkish by a plain red one,because they didn't liked a ribbon which matches too much the greek flag.

On few documented award you may also be disapointed when you discover that there is a mistake in the Prieto listing or also in the Gaszewski listing (for this last one there is some mistake in the malaysian states ribbons).Sometimes you discover the mistake ounce you see,or discuss with an officer of this country.

It's ever a hard job.

Emmanuel

[Ulsterman]

Well, we can be sure of the UN medal too, which I am convinced is a Derg era award. Also, we know about the bravery medals for certain. I am 99% certain that the Derg had tricolor style ribbons for most of their awards. I would bet $20 that the Refugees medal was red/white/red.

I am searching for photos of awards. The Derg didn't wear many of them in the videos I have found, BUT the Ethiopian military alumni associations in the USA have many guys in them who list their awards proudly. Hopefully, I will be able to interview somebody locally soon who can tell me for certain.

[Antonio Prieto]

Greetings

I follow with attention most of threads of the forum, but specially those of the countries where I have but difficulty in obtaining data

Thanks to all for the appointments and references to my Web will be tens of errors, that treatment to correct cradled I have the news of them

Whenever Indeed it is possible to me I put the data of the regulations of you compensate or official dispositions, but this not always is possible and the sources of intelligence are numerous, although not always trustworthy, not by bad intention, but because sometimes the ribbons that accompany the medals do not correspond with reals

In this case, before the contradictory news, not as ribbon to leave and of course, whatever it has information that any people to make me arrive to correct the errors of the ribbon plates, that do not doubt in doing it, and as soon as is possible to me I will update the plates

Edited February 7, 2009 by Antonio Prieto

[Archer]

Among a lot of other items recently acquired came the Republic of Uganda Medal bearing the effigy of the dictator, Idi Amin Dada.

Any information about this one?

Cheers

William

[Ulsterman]

Hmmmmm... I saw a similar one at a show last month for a mere $200! The ribbon was different and i thought Dutch though.

I think its a merit medal.

anyone?

[Archer]

I am extremely happy to say that this did not cost me anything like $200!

[ilja559]

Order of the Pearl of Africa. Grand Master. And Kagera medal.

Source: http://in2eastafrica.net/kagame-dedicates-medals-to-rwandans-ugandans/

[ilja559]

With Luwero Triangle medal

Source: http://www.daylife.com/photo/0dXF7mR3CW4wj?__site=daylife&q=Paul+Kagame

[heusy68]

Hello Gentlemen, here is a picture of the Uganda Kagera River Medal.

The medal is made by Spink years ago,and in the early 2000 it was possible to got it in London for 15 £ to 25 £ from dealers.But now the stock is empty.

Diameter 36 millimeters & reverse is blank.

Emmanuel

[heusy68]

.

Edited January 28, 2012 by heusy68