IN SHORT: A TikTok video shows Ugandan president Yoweri Museveni apparently instructing police not to point their guns at civilians during crowd control. It claims he was reacting to orders made by Kenyan officials in 2025. But the video is from 2020.
A TikTok video shows Ugandan president Yoweri Museveni in military attire, addressing a crowd while holding a stick.
Referring to police officers, he tells them not to aim their guns at citizens, but to save that for real enemies. He notes that he has seen this behaviour from some officers.
At one point, he picks up a gun to demonstrate how this should be done. He places the gun on his back, then uses his open palms to demonstrate how officers should control a crowd without pointing weapons at them.
The audience applauds as he does this.
The video has two captions: “President Museveni reacts to Kenya’s shoot-to-kill order” and “Control riots with brains, not bullets”.
It has received over 407,000 views, over 19,000 likes and more than 2,500 shares.
Context
In June and July 2025, Kenya experienced major protests, partly sparked by the death of Albert Ojwang, a young man killed in police custody.
Some of the protests turned violent. Police officers were injured, some police stations were set on fire and some firearms were stolen. In response, Kenya’s interior cabinet secretary Kipchumba Murkomen said police should shoot anyone who approached a police station. Despite clear disagreement from the crowd, who said the police should arrest, not shoot, he maintained this position.
In another speech to officers, he repeated this message, saying these were “orders from above” and that police would be protected.
Later, president William Ruto said police should shoot protesters in the leg, take them to the hospital and then jail them. A few days later, Nelson Koech, a member of parliament, said police should actually “shoot to kill”.
These comments from government officials sparked public anger and were widely condemned, including by veteran politician Raila Odinga, who is now part of a “broad-based government” with Ruto. Murkomen later retracted his shoot-to-kill directive.
The TikTok video suggests that Museveni was responding to the statements by the Kenyan leaders. But is that accurate? We checked.
Video from 2020 and not about Kenya
A reverse image search of keyframes in the video leads to the original footage, which shows it had nothing to do with Kenya. The footage was taken on 5 January 2020, while Museveni was on a six-day march through a jungle in Uganda.
During the march, he shared his past experiences with people and gave talks on leadership, peace and discipline. The circulating clip is from a speech that he delivered on the second day of the trek.
He criticised what he said was the behaviour of some police officers who had pointed their guns at citizens during crowd control. However, he was addressing a situation in Uganda, not referencing Kenya.
The TikTok video is old and has been edited to make it look like Museveni is reacting to 2025 events in Kenya.
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