Meet Gen. Dick Olum, the UPDF chief protected by only female bodyguards

Gen. Olum, who is the commander of the Uganda People's Defence Forces (U.P.D.F.) Mountain Brigade revealed this in a video shared by NBS TV on Wednesday.

He said: "A girl child is something that personally, as a parent, as a father to girls... many girls than the boys is something that strikes me.

"I want to show you my personal feeling about the girl child. My personal feeling. I'm protected by girls strictly. Some people had so many views. People spoke so many things about my girls.

"But I'm here six months with them. I have fought with them in Congo. They've never feared. They are daredevils as I am.

"They fire any type of gun. Not only the simple AKs. They fire all machine guns. They've fought with me everywhere. I've gone with them everywhere I go. They don't lie down. They are specialists in so many weapons. They fire all of them. They are physically fit."

Maj. Gen. Dick Olum was appointed Mountain Brigade commander in October 2022, replacing Lt Gen Kayanja Muhanga who was appointed commander of Land Forces.

Lt. Gen. Muhanga replaced Gen. Muhoozi Kainerugaba, the senior presidential advisor on Special Operations.

Gen. Olum is also the overall command of Operation Shujaa, a military campaign launched in the Eastern Democratic Republic of Congo to eliminate terrorist groups in the region. The Operation was previously overseen by Gen. Kainerugaba.

According to publically available information, Gen. Dick Olum was born in Zombo District, West Nile sub-region, Northern Region of Uganda in 1970.

Prior to his current position, he was Uganda’s military attache at the Ugandan embassy in the D.R.C.

From April 2015, until October 2017, he was the commanding officer of the third army division of the UPDF, based in Moroto.

Before that, he served as the commander of the UPDF contingent in Somalia as part of the African Union Mission to Somalia (AMISOM).

In 2006, when the Uganda Junior Staff College, based in Jinja, was founded, Lt. Col. Olum was selected to be its commandant. In 2010, at the rank of colonel, he was transferred to the Uganda Military Academy in Kabamba as chief instructor.

In 2012, the African Union (AU) established a 5,000-strong military force, based in Nzara, South Sudan, with the objective of hunting down fugitive warlord Joseph Kony.

The force was composed of troops from the African countries affected by the Lord’s Resistance Army insurgency, namely Uganda, South Sudan, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, and the Central African Republic.

Col. Olum was selected as the first commander of the AU force against Kony.In June 2013, he was assigned to lead the UPDF contingent to AMISOM and was appointed acting brigadier. He assumed his post in Somalia in September 2013.

The former president of Lybia Muammar Gaddafi also preferred female bodyguards.