Flag of Uganda
Uganda’s flag is six horizontal stripes, black, yellow and red repeated, with a white disc in the centre holding a grey crowned crane, the national bird, facing the pole. Uganda’s mission to the United Nations explains the black as Africa’s people, the yellow as the sunshine of an equatorial country and the red as brotherhood with the rest of Africa and the world.
How to read it
The flag was adopted on 9 October 1962, the day Uganda became independent, according to Store norske leksikon, which describes six stripes of equal width, black, yellow, red, black, yellow and red from the top, with a white disc over the two middle stripes showing a grey crowned crane (Balearica regulorum). Its proportions are 2:3. Article 8 of the 1995 Constitution keeps in use the national flag in use before it came into force. The encyclopedia says the flag was drawn by C. Todd for a committee led by Grace Ibingira.
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The crane
The grey crowned crane was Uganda’s badge before independence: as a British colony, Store norske leksikon says, Uganda flew the Blue Ensign with the crane in a disc. Uganda’s mission to the United Nations says the crane on the flag stands on one leg facing the pole, and that the raised leg means Uganda is moving forward, not standing still. The mission also notes that the crane has all three national colours.
Adoko Nekyon, a minister in the 1962 government, told the Daily Monitor that the crane was taken from the Uganda police flag, and that the white disc was there to contrast with the other colours.
Why the flag isn’t green, blue and gold
The first colours chosen were different. The Daily Monitor found that Senteza Kajubi, chairman of the National Flag Committee, wrote in the Uganda Argus of 2 April 1962 that the committee had agreed on green, blue and gold. Norway’s Store norske leksikon says the Democratic Party government of the time introduced a flag of green, blue and green vertical stripes with a crane in the middle.
After the Uganda People’s Congress (UPC) won the election of 25 April 1962, the new government chose a flag based on the UPC party flag. Lex says the black, yellow and red come from it. Nekyon told the Monitor that the cabinet committee also considered the colours of the Uganda National Congress, red, blue and black, which became the UPC’s, and replaced the blue with yellow, partly because yellow was close to the orange of the Kabaka Yekka party.
Without the crane
A black, yellow and red striped flag with no crane in a white disc is not Uganda’s flag, the Daily Monitor points out; it is often hoisted by mistake.
Read next
- Next in African flagsFlag of AngolaAngola’s flag is red over black with a yellow emblem in the centre: part of a cogwheel, a machete and a five-pointed star. Its constitution says the red is the blood shed by Angolans under colonial oppression, in the liberation struggle and in defence of the country, and the black is the African continent; the cogwheel stands for workers and industry, the machete for peasants, farming and the armed struggle, the star for international solidarity and progress, and their yellow for the country’s wealth.
- The same shape in Asian flagsFlag of IndiaThree equal bands of saffron, white and green, with a navy blue wheel of 24 spokes, the Ashoka Chakra, in the centre. The Flag Code of India quotes Dr S. Radhakrishnan’s explanation to the Constituent Assembly in 1947: saffron for renunciation, white for light and the path of truth, green for the relation to the soil, and the wheel for the law of dharma and for motion.
More african flags
The same shape elsewhere
Browse symbols drawn with circles, lines or squares and rectangles.
Sources
- Constitution of Uganda, 1995 (Constitute Project), Constitution of the Republic of Uganda, 1995 (rev. 2017), art. 8 (English text), Constitute Project, art. 8
- Ugandan National Symbols (Permanent Mission of Uganda to the United Nations), Permanent Mission of the Republic of Uganda to the United Nations, New York, “Ugandan National Symbols”, Permanent Mission of Uganda to the United Nations, Flag of Uganda
- Ugandas flagg og våpen (Store norske leksikon), Lars Roede, “Ugandas flagg og våpen”, Store norske leksikon, Store norske leksikon, article text
- Ugandas nationalflag (Lex), Christian Fogd Pedersen, “Ugandas nationalflag”, Lex – Danmarks Nationalleksikon, Lex – Danmarks Nationalleksikon, article text
- Why the original national flag colours didn’t fly at Uhuru (Daily Monitor), “Why the original national flag colours didn’t fly at Uhuru”, Daily Monitor, Kampala (dated 29 December 2025 on the page), Daily Monitor (Monitor Publications, Nation Media Group), article text
Researched, edited and approved by Rory Hansen before publishing. Last reviewed October 13, 2026. How we research
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