Who is Fred Enanga? Flash Uganda Media looks at his biography, early life, tribe, education, wife, father, mother and family of the Commissioner of the Uganda Police Force.
Fred Enanga is a Commissioner of the Uganda Police Force, the current mouthpiece of the Force and an Economist by profession.
A Luo by ethnicity, Enanga is a Ugandan and a very pleasant man, soft-spoken, follow orders and maximum respect for his superiors. The name Enanga carries different meanings in different languages in Uganda.
The Bantu have a different meaning for it. However, in Luo, it is a well-grown up strong type of tree. That’s where the name Enanga was derived from.
Early Life and Education
Fred Enanga born to a family of 10 grew up in Kampala with his parents. His ancestral home is in Apac District, Ayago village in Akokoro sub-county, Northern Region of Uganda.
According to Enanga, Apac district is well gifted with fresh waters, fish and the main activity in the area is cattle keeping.
Enanga’s father Mr George Echonga, a police officer by then lived in Entebbe a Kampala neighbourhood where he raised his children from. He retired as a superintendent. Enanga’s mother is Christine Echonga, who got married to Enanga’s father at 14 years.
His mother is an uneducated woman but very hardworking, she used to make samosas for a living, so, Enanga and his siblings used to carry the samosas down to Kamwokya helping their mother. After a while, their mother got a stall in Kamwokya market and thereafter started dealing in produce.
Enanga’s parents are his role models whom he really looks up for. He says they didn’t sleep in a unit, they had a two-roomed house having police furniture (metallic chairs and tables) while in Entebbe.
After some time, Enanga’s family relocated to Kamwokya, Kanjokya street plot 6, and again after some years Enanga’s family moved to Kawempe where his father had built a two-roomed house, Enanga was in S.6 by then. Enanga was very playful and stubborn during his childhood days.
Enanga was born to a family of ten, but as of today, they are five children living; two boys and three girls.
Fred Enanga attended Peter Piper Nursery School then Mugwanya Preparatory School for his early school life that’s from P.1 to P.4. Then he moved to St Savio from P.5 to P.7.
After, Enanga joined Lango College for his O’ Level education (boarding section) then Kololo SSS and then Kitante Hill for his A’ Level education respectively.
He narrates, pupils at Mugwanga used to make fun of the name; they used to call him enanga, others ekinanga. Sometimes he would get offended but he later got used to that.
Enanga then joined Makerere University and graduated with a bachelor’s degree in Social Sciences. He specialized in Economics, so Enanga is an economist by profession.
Joining Police Force
Fred Enanga was inspired by his father to join the Uganda Police Force; he appreciated the profession and then got attracted towards it. Enanga participated a lot in police activities. There used to be police bands and programmes where they witnessed their parents’ participation.
And even when they could go visit their dad, the respect and smartness were there, so this attracted him more. Enanga’s father always encouraged him to study very hard and become a pilot.
That was his major dream alongside seeing his son become a doctor, he wanted Enanga to study medicine on the other hand.
However, Enanga did not perform well in sciences at S.4. But because of scores of insurgences that existed in northern Uganda back then, Enanga failed to perform better.
He attained a second grade and didn’t get a science combination, so this distanced him from his father’s dreams. He enrolled for an art combination and went on to become an economist.
Enanga joined Police in 2001 after his graduation in 1998; this was after he experienced a short stint at Union College close to Bahai Temple which no longer exists where he worked as an economics teacher.
After vacating Union College, Enanga joined Christian Children’s Fund, where he acquired a Suzuki motorcycle. However, after two years, his dad began advising him that these are not permanent jobs, they are contract jobs and you could lose them anytime.
He advised him to get a government job. Enanga listened to his father and began applying and attending interviews; with Bank of Uganda, and other financial institutions. Even Uganda Society of Disabled Children USDC needed some coordinator in Lira. He did that interview at the same time he did the interview with public service to join the police.
Nevertheless, his mother’s resistance did not cease him from perusing the cause; Enanga eventually joined the police in 2001. They did the aptitude in early 2000 at Kyambogo with over 3000 applicants and they wanted 45 slots.
That is the lot of Afande Kaweesi, Laban Muhabwe, Simeo Nsubuga, and Grace Akullo. So Enanga returned as a cadet superintendent of police.
Enanga began working in Entebbe as Operations officer. In 2002 during the Itongwa insurgency where they were attacking police posts, Enanga and colleagues withdrew and closed some of these posts such that guns don’t end in the wrong hands.
Then there were the fishermen at Nakiwogo, a landing site in Bugonga, there were clashes between the Bantu and West Nile people over spending more time on the waters and so on.
These two incidences were Enanga’s last major success in restoring sanity. “I picked on my best team and really had to exhibit police authority and we arrested people. We maintained on charging those people in court. I was happy that after those enforcement measures, there was sanity. They started calling me Kayanja. It was just eight months but full of operations.”
After this, Enanga was promoted OC CID, Nateete while still a cadet. He was among the 14 officers who were promoted. Enanga served for six months there and they reduced on incidents of mob justice in the likes of Kitebi and towards Busega.
“What we used to do was to take the body first then come back and pick you when there is no heat of passion. Then guys would say; what style is this guy using?”
So, after six months, Enanga was transferred and given a district, Ssembabule district CID officer and he was also confirmed from there as a full assistant superintendent of police under DPC Madam Agaba Alison; who is now in South Sudan. We worked for a good three years. There were very complicated cases, land and politics. There were gruesome murders, Enanga narrates.
From Ssembabule, Enanga was transferred to Lira municipality as district CID Officer. I was there for one and a half years. But I had two courses in between. There was a course in Kyankwanzi in leadership and an executive leadership course in Japan that Enanga attended in 2007.
After that, Enanga was transferred to CID headquarters as a staff officer. So, he got into management, in CID administration department for almost two years.
In Lira Municipality, Enanga doubled as Public Relations Officer for CID. They handled the Kato Kajubi case, Minister Jim Muhwezi and Mike Mukula cases. Godi case that also came in around that time, after that, he went to Darfur for 20 months.
When Enanga returned, he was redeployed to CID to head the economics crime department which he did also for about six to seven months. He was then transferred to Kampala metropolitan as CID commander.
Enanga served CID for six weeks. Then he enrolled for a course, however, h encountered some challenges in that course and he stayed home for another six months. He was then deployed into land protection.
Barely two weeks into the land protection, there was the crisis in Kayunga District: Hon Nantaba and related incidents of land grabbing. Enanga took another four months in Kayunga. He’s grateful that his efforts in the matter bore fruits.
Enanga and his team produced a very concrete report where they displayed the irregularities that were in Kayunga land matters.
Personality
Fred Enanga is a hard-working man. Nonetheless, he doesn’t like working under pressure. According to him, you end up messing up, he likes doing things slowly but surely.
Enanga is a perfectionist. He says he gets angered when he doesn’t get excellent returns as he expected. He feels cheated when people do not handle him the same way he does.
And to those who accuse him of being partisan, and the various statements he makes that many disagree with, sometimes claiming their false statements. It doesn’t upset him, reasoning that whatever he does is in accordance with the law.
Family
Fred Enanga is happily married to beautiful Edith, and together they have children; three boys and three girls. “The one thing I like about her is she stands by me and she doesn’t want to expose herself to certain levels; she lives a simple life.”
