Attachments
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
As Uganda’s February 2016 presidential and parliamentary elections approach, in what will be President Yoweri Museveni’s 30th year in power, police have disrupted peaceful opposition gatherings using excessive force, arbitrarily arrested opposition politicians, and tortured individuals aligned with the opposition. Restrictions on freedom of assembly hindered the ability of Ugandans to receive information and engage with politicians, before presidential campaigns started in November 2015.
This report documents some of the key human rights incidents between July and October 2015 as politicians vied to be presidential candidates. With the launch of the parliamentary campaigns on 7 December 2015, Amnesty International urgently calls on the Ugandan authorities to ensure that all Ugandans enjoy equal rights to attend political rallies, engage with candidates, and express their views, during and after the remainder of the campaign period.
Amnesty International conducted research for this report in September, October and November 2015 in Uganda. It is based on interviews with 88 individuals, including with victims and eyewitnesses, relatives of victims, senior Ugandan police officers, representatives of the Uganda Human Rights Commission (UHRC), lawyers, representatives of civil society, journalists and political activists. Documentary evidence has been used to corroborate information.
Police used excessive force to disperse peaceful opposition gatherings using tear gas and rubber bullets in Soroti and Jinja in September 2015. The police told Amnesty International that they had the power under the Public Order Management Act to disperse these crowds, as the assemblies were unlawful under Ugandan law. The purported illegality of these gatherings is contested by the opposition. However, the right to freedom of assembly is so important that authorities should not use excessive force to break up peaceful assemblies even if they are unlawful.
Opposition politicians, most prominently Dr. Kizza Besigye of the Forum for Democratic Change (FDC), were repeatedly placed under “preventive arrest”. The police justified this by saying that they intended to hold unlawful rallies, not consultations, and that notification had not been provided under the Public Order Management Act. These arrests, which restricted the ability of politicians to engage with Ugandans, are unlawful under Ugandan and international law. Youth activists and other individuals aligned with opposition political parties were also arrested, detained, and in two cases subjected to torture.
Uganda’s Electoral Commission, criticized by electoral observation missions in previous elections, stated that political “rallies” were unlawful before the campaign period. The Presidential Elections Act, which governs consultative meetings of individuals aspiring to be presidential candidates is not precise enough for politicians to interpret the law and regulate their conduct accordingly. The selective application of the Public Order Management Act by the Ugandan police has privileged the incumbent, as President Museveni regularly addresses large public events discussing politics with the electorate.