Amin (Dada), Idi (1925–2003)

Ugandan politician, president 1971–79. He led the coup that deposed Milton Obote in 1971, expelled the Asian community in 1972, and exercised a reign of terror over his people during which an estimated 300,000 people were killed. After he invaded Tanzania in 1978, the Tanzanian army combined with dissident Ugandans to counter-attack. Despite assistance from Libya, Amin's forces collapsed and he fled in 1979. He now lives in Saudi Arabia.

Amin was commissioned into the new Ugandan army in 1962 and an alliance with President Obote led to rapid promotion; by 1966 he was commander of the armed forces. Mounting evidence of Amin's corruption and brutality had convinced Obote to replace him at the end of 1970, but Amin seized power before he could do so. He suspended the constitution and all political activity and took legislative and executive powers into his own hands. During his brutal regime a large proportion of the educated elite were killed or fled into exile, as well as significant numbers of the Acholi and Langi peoples and Christians. His so-called ‘economic war’ against foreign domination resulted in the mass expulsion of the Asian population in 1972, appropriation of their assets promoting further collapse in the economy.

Amin was born into the marginal Kakwa ethnic group in the northern pastoral periphery of Uganda, and received no formal schooling. He joined the colonial army in 1946, originally as a cook, and later fought the Mau Mau in Kenya. Between 1951 and 1960 he was the heavyweight boxing champion of Uganda.