The Deputy Inspector General of Ugandan Police, Maj Gen Paul Lokech has died, the Uganda People’s Defence Force (UPDF) announced in a statement on Twitter on Saturday. Their statement said:
”UPDF fraternity regrets to announce the passing on of the Deputy Inspector General of Police Maj Gen Paul Lokech. May His Soul Rest In Eternal Peace.”
The Uganda People’s Defence Force (UPDF)
According to Police, Maj Gen Paul Lokech suddenly passed away from his home on the morning of Saturday 21st August 2021. The Inspector-General of Police (IGP), Mr Martin Okoth Ochola has requested a post-mortem to determine the cause of death. He said:
”I have tasked the Director of Medical Services, Dr Moses Byaruhanga to carry out post-mortem to establish the cause of death.”
Inspector General of Police (IGP), Mr Martin Okoth Ochola
About Paul Lokech
Paul Lokech, was a senior military officer at the rank of Major General, in the Uganda People’s Defence Forces (UPDF), who was appointed Deputy Inspector General of Police of the Uganda Police Force on 16 December 2020. Between November 2017 and December 2019, he served on a special assignment “to monitor on behalf of the guarantors of the South Sudan peace process, the assembling, screening, demobilization and integration of the armed forces of South Sudan”.
Before that, he served as Chief of Staff of the UPDF Air Force, for a period of five months, from 11 July 2019, until 11 December 2019.
Prior to that, from December 2018 until July 2019, he was Commandant of Uganda Rapid Deployment Capability Centre (URDCC), in Jinja, in the Eastern Region of Uganda. He was appointed to that position in December 2018. He succumbed to a blood clot on 21 August 2021.
Military career
His military career includes service in various leadership capacities, including two tours as the Commander of the Uganda contingent to Somalia, as part of the AMISOM peace-keeping force. The first tour was between 2011 and 2012. During this first tour, Lokech commanded Battle Groups Eight and Nine, responsible for ejecting Al-Shabaab militants from Mogadishu in 2011.
His second Somalia rotation was from 2017 until 2018.
Before his second tour in Somalia, he was the Commanding Officer of the Second UPDF Division, based at Makenke Barracks, in Mbarara, in the Western Region of Uganda. He has previously served as the Military Attaché at Uganda’s Embassy to Russia, based in Moscow.
He has also served as part of Uganda’s peace-keeping forces in South Sudan. He was part of Operation Safe Haven (OSH), a UPDF operation in the Democratic Republic of the Congo intended to neutralize the rebel Allied Democratic Forces (ADF).
The Kalongo Times is a news publication which celebrates progress and development in Kalongo town and the wider Deaconry (formally Kalongo Mission). The Deaconry encompasses present-day Agago, part of Pader, part of Kitgum and part of Abim.