On the 19th of Oct, a new announcement related to Uganda People's Defence Forces (UPDF) was made by the commander of land forces. Lieutenant General Muhoozi Kainerugaba made an announcement that new addition is being made to the UPDF fighting vehicle collection. This new addition is called Infantry Fighting Vehicle (IFV). The announcement was made by Muhoozi on the 19th of October in the form of a photograph. The picture shows the commander’s father along with the vehicle. The announcement elaborated that the vehicle is fully developed in Uganda.
The IFV is known to have a certain level of resemblance to a mine-resistant, ambush-protected vehicle (MRAP) by the name of Nyati has been developed by the South African company Twiga. Although Chui does seem to have some resemblance certain features do differ. The South African defense news did produce some material related to Twiga. In accordance with the highlights, Twiga was under licensed production for an African client. However, sources did not reveal the name of the buyer due to obvious confidentiality reasons.
Twiga also seems to have an associate company based in Kampala that goes by the name of Impala Services and Logistics. This company had previously constructed maintenance and manufacturing sites for Nyati at Magamaga Barracks, which comes under UPDF.
Twiga also issued a statement highlighting potential differences between Nyati and Chui. According to this statement, Nyati comes with a light turret that has accommodation for a 20mm machine gun. On the other hand, Chui has accommodation for a 12 mm machine gun along with other certain features including two QZL-87 grenade launchers. These are installed on pintle mounts and can be initiated from the passenger compartment.
