Mutesa II of Buganda

Who is Mutesa II of Buganda?

Sir Edward Frederick William David Walugembe Mutebi Luwangula Mutesa II became kabaka of Buganda in November 1939 and later served as the first president of independent Uganda from 1962 to 1966, a ceremonial head of state role held alongside executive prime minister Milton Obote. Educated in Uganda and at Cambridge University in England, he was known to the foreign press as "King Freddie." In 1953 the British colonial governor Andrew Cohen deposed and exiled him to London after he refused to cooperate with British plans for East African federation, sparking the Kabaka Crisis; popular protest forced his return two years later as a constitutional monarch. After independence, escalating tension between Buganda's traditional autonomy and Obote's central government culminated in 1966, when Obote suspended the constitution, declared himself executive president, and sent troops to storm the Kabaka's palace at Mengo. Mutesa II fled into exile in Britain, where he lived in difficult circumstances until his death in London in 1969.

Sources: Wikipedia, "Mutesa II of Buganda" · Britannica, "Mutesa II, Ugandan ruler" · State House Uganda, "President Sir Edward Luwangula Walugembe Muteesa II"