KAMPALA — When Ethiopian aviation veteran Girma Wake walked into the parliamentary chambers to face the Committee on Commissions, Statutory Authorities and State Enterprises (COSASE), he did not offer bureaucratic platitudes. Instead, the 83-year-old interim chief executive delivered an unvarnished post-mortem of an airline that had teetered on the edge of total operational collapse.
Appointed in February 2026 by President Yoweri Museveni following the abrupt ouster of former CEO Jenifer Bamuturaki, Wake took the helm of a national carrier whose widebody fleet was practically paralyzed, its vendor relationships severed, and roughly 80% of its passenger-carrying capacity wiped out.
The Anatomy of an Operational Grounding
Upon his arrival on February 17, Wake uncovered an equipment crisis far deeper than public disclosures had suggested. While Uganda Airlines nominally possessed a fleet of seven aircraft—four Bombardier CRJ900s, two Airbus A330-800neo widebodies, and one leased Airbus A320—most of its flying capacity sat dormant on the tarmac.
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