Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni rejected a plan to build Idi Amin memorial institute, noting that it is inappropriate to establish one for him, Ugandan newspaper Daily Monitor reported.
The president explained his decision in a letter addressed to the country's Education and Sports Minister and First Lady Janet Museveni, saying that Amin's regime was unconstitutional and atrocious, the media said.
"Idi Amin's government was clearly illegal. It had no right to install itself over our country. Apart from his unconstitutionality, he committed a lot of crimes-the killing of the Acholi and Lango soldiers in Mbarara, the killing of the prisoners in Mutukula prison, and the killing of Ben Kiwanuka, Basil Bataringaya and his wife and so many other killings," the incumbent head of state noted.
Earlier, the state's National Council for Higher Education (NCHE) received a request for guidance on licensing of the institute, the report revealed.
"This is a wrong request and it should be rejected […] it is not acceptable to license an institute to promote or study the work of Idi Amin," Museveni's response to a consultative letter from NCHE was quoted by the outlet as saying.
However, one of the proponents of the establishment of the institute Hassan Fungaroo is convinced that the institute should be created to advance history of Uganda, to foster research, reconciliation and conflict resolution.
Amin came to power in a coup in 1971, as a result of which the then-leader of the state Milton Obote was overturned, and ruled the country for eight years. Following the coup, he allegedly killed soldiers from Acholi and Langi, local tribes long loyal to Obote, in the country's western city of Mbarara.
The leader's operations to dispose of officers in his army from certain tribes provoked a revolt within Amin's forces. Fighting with the rebels resulted in the November 1972 massacres at the Mutukula prison camp, located in Uganda's central region.
Moreover, the first prime minister of the East African state, Otobe's ally, Benedicto Kiwanuka, who was among those who led the country's transition from between colonial British rule to independence, along with Basil Bataringaya, Ugandan Minister of Internal Affairs under Otobe, were murdered in the early years of Amin's rule.
During Amin's leadership, the property of Asians and Europeans in Uganda was requisitioned, persons of Indian and Pakistani origin living in Uganda who did not have local citizenship were expelled from the country. He also redirected Uganda's foreign policy, severing diplomatic relations with Israel and the United Kingdom and beginning cooperation with Arab states and the Soviet Union.
In addition, Amin put forward territorial claims to Tanzania and Kenya, starting armed clashes on the Ugandan-Tanzanian border. Due to increased government spending, he froze wages in the public sector, cut funding for social programs and medicine. In response to the discontent of the population, which became massive, the leader launched repressions, which reportedly resulted in thousands of deaths.
In 1979, Tanzanian forces took over Uganda's capital Kampala, prompting the leader to flee the East African state. Threatened with a military tribunal, Amin then spent time in Libya before moving to Saudi Arabia in December 1979. After an unsuccessful attempt to return to Uganda in 1989, he was sent back to Saudi Arabia, where he lived in exile until his death in 2003 at the age of 78.