He Was Crowned on This Day. He Will Be Buried on This Day. Fort Portal Says Goodbye to King Oyo.

FORT PORTAL — The first mourners arrived at St John’s Cathedral before dawn.

By 5am, service providers were already at their posts on the forecourt of the cathedral in Fort Portal City. By 6am, the first groups of mourners had begun arriving — streaming in from across the kingdom, from across Uganda, from Nigeria and other countries whose delegations had confirmed attendance, from everywhere that the name Oyo Nyimba Kabamba Iguru Rukidi IV was known and loved.

By 8am, the congregation was in place. At 8:15am, the body of King Oyo left Karuziika Palace for the last time. The nine days of mourning were ending. The day of burial had come.

And not just any day. September 12. The anniversary of his coronation. The day, thirty-one years ago, when a three-year-old boy was dressed in royal regalia and seated on the throne of Tooro. He was buried today on the same date he became a king. Tooro did not plan it that way. It is simply when he died — and the symmetry is the kind that cannot be manufactured.

**The Programme: From Palace to Cathedral to Karambi**

The burial programme released by the organising committee, announced by co-chairperson Dr Richard Rwabuhinga on Tuesday, was precise in every detail.

At 8:15am, King Oyo’s body — referred to traditionally as Omuguta — departed Karuziika Palace in the official procession. By 8:30am it was received at St John’s Cathedral. Public viewing of the body at the cathedral lasted less than 45 minutes. Prayers commenced at 9am. The service — presided over by the Archbishop of the Church of Uganda, the Most Reverend Stephen Kaziimba Mugalu — was scheduled to end at 1pm. Speeches were limited to four people.

Following the cathedral service, the procession continued to the Karambi Royal Tombs along Fort Portal-Kasese Road — six kilometres from the cathedral, along the same road that has carried Tooro’s kings to their rest for generations. Protocol was strict on who could ride. No more than 20 to 30 vehicles were issued stickers for the procession to the royal tombs — the Queen Mother, members of the royal family, the princesses, the Omujwera Musuuga, bishops, the Archbishop, and the President’s representative. Everyone else walked.

“It is a final expression of love for the late king,” Dr Rwabuhinga said at the announcement.

The public was barred from accessing Karambi Royal Tombs during the burial itself. The ancient rites to be conducted there are reserved for those mandated to conduct them. Tooro Kingdom Deputy Prime Minister Henry Basaliza Araali explained that the restriction was intended to preserve the sanctity of the royal rites and ensure the final rituals were conducted according to Tooro cultural practices.

**The Rituals of Gasani**

Inside Karambi Royal Tombs — in the place the Babiito call Gasani, the house of the kings — the final farewell will be governed not by a programme, but by ritual.

The head of the royal ritualists, known as Omusuuna, leads the traditional team responsible for what happens at the grave. As the procession approaches the gate of Gasani, a prescribed exchange takes place between the Omusuuna and the Katikiro of Gasani — the person responsible for the royal tombs. Nothing proceeds until that exchange is complete.

When the casket has been placed in the grave, the Omusuuna guides the incoming king in the custom of casting nine coffee berries into the grave — nine, for the nine clans of Tooro, each one a kingdom joining in the act of farewell. It is among the most ancient of the Babiito rites, a thread of continuity running from the kings who came before to the king who is about to take his place.

King Oyo will be the fourth Omukama buried at Karambi Royal Tombs, joining Sir David Kyebambe Kasagama, Sir George David Kamurasi Rukidi III and Patrick Matthew Kaboyo Olimi III — his own father, who died when Oyo was three years old and whose passing first placed the crown on a child who could not yet fully understand what it meant.

Tooro Kingdom Prime Minister Calvin Armstrong Rwomiire Rwomiire was emphatic about one cultural obligation that must be observed regardless of all else: “In our culture, we don’t bury beyond 3pm. We must keep our culture.”

**The King Who Is Gone**

King Oyo died on August 27, 2026, in Dallas, Texas, where he had travelled for medical treatment. Kahawatungu and other outlets with sources close to the royal family confirmed what Tooro Kingdom had not publicly disclosed: he had been battling aggressive brain cancer and died following complications from the illness. He was 34 years old.

He was born on April 16, 1992. He became king on September 12, 1995 — the day his father died. He was crowned the world’s youngest reigning monarch by Guinness World Records. He reigned for thirty-one years. The Queen Mother, Best Kemigisa, accompanied his casket on the journey from Dallas Fort Worth International Airport on September 2. She buried her son today.

**The King Who Is Coming**

Prince Edward Rukidi Kijanangoma — named by the Babiito royal succession committee on Wednesday evening with 19 of 21 votes — will cast the nine coffee berries into his predecessor’s grave today. It will be his first act as Omukama-elect in the presence of the ritual that formally transfers the moral weight of the throne from one man to another.

He is 56 years old. He was a news anchor at Uganda Broadcasting Corporation. He is described by colleagues who worked with him there — including Mary Tumwikirize, who spoke to a television interviewer this week — as “someone you don’t get to find in scandals, someone that is so quiet.”

The new Tooro Kingdom inherits a considerable royal estate — swathes of land, government grants, the palace, the institutional machinery of a 14th-century kingdom in a 21st-century country. He will be enthroned in a ceremony yet to be announced.

But first, today, at Karambi — in the presence of the Omusuuna and the Katikiro of Gasani and the Archbishop and the Queen Mother and the thousands who walked six kilometres in the September heat to say goodbye — the man who was king for thirty-one years will be laid to rest beside the kings who came before him.

He was crowned on this day. He will be buried on this day.

September 12.

SOURCE DAILY MONITOR