POST 2016
The rapid decline of freedoms in Uganda casts a prospect of doom. Each day, Uganda slides into a state of anarchy and this is perpetuated by state agencies. This decline has resulted in restriction of social, economic and political rights and spaces for Ugandans. This sad state of affairs threatens to undo our strides toward a democratic society.
In less than five years, we have seen drastic changes in the attitude of the state which has become extremely contemptuous of the 1995 Constitution. This confirms that we are continuously reneging from our commitment towards constitutionalism and rule of law.
We continue to bear witness to the evolution of the police to a fully militarized and politicized force; the army and the other security agencies have become instruments of coercion and repression. The common man is left to the vagaries of nature, while the state protects the interest of the ruling elite.
In the last five years, the state has made advances into our private lives. Our conversations are intercepted by the state in total disregard of privacy and confidentiality rights as citizens. Our elected leaders are forcefully removed in total disregards of the mandate of the people who elected them in a manner consistent with Chapter 1(1) of the Constitution. In this way, the state wants to usurp our freedom of expression and the exercising of it.
The justice system has been infiltrated by political appointees who are also conspicuously regime minders. Now than ever before, everyone feels that the judicial system operates on probability of fairness, rather than principles.
The Fourth Estate has borne the brunt of state intolerance through draconian anti-free media laws. Journalists face job insecurity the moment they appear critical of the regime, considered to be empathetic to divergent views and probably, not promoting the regime enough
The enactment of the notorious Public Order Management Act (POMA) has, hitherto, complicated the natural exercise of human liberties and the enjoyment of basic and fundamental freedoms to assemble and associate.
A critical analysis of these repressions, which also manifests in the replenishing of its apparatuses, reveals a deeper sense of mutually exclusive interests between the ruled and their perpetual rulers.
The zeal to radically curtail social, political and economic rights as enumerated above points to one direction; that the regime has become indifferent to fundamental human liberties, notably, the freedom of assembly, freedom of speech and freedom of association.
This also explains why they won’t build good roads; they will prevent public rallies and have instituted preventive arrests. In addition, their impulsive urge to tap into our private telephone conversations and read our emails attests to a situation which is governed my fear, rather than mutual hope.
Moreover, the enjoyment of these rights are enshrined in Chapter 4(29)(1)(a-e) of the Ugandan Constitution that must be revised and upheld by the Police. By extension, the freedom for intellectual development has been rudely thwarted to a stupefying extent.
It appears that the human imagination which enthuse this regime has in essence, conceptualized that the governable Ugandan is one chained in iron shackles. To this end, it has undermined the 1995 Uganda Constitution (as amended), repeatedly with impunity. And yet Chapter 4(20)(1) and (2) of that Constitution is explicit in its affirmation that fundamental freedoms are inherent, and not granted by the state; that the rights of individuals and groups shall be respected and guaranteed by all organs of the state.
If all these assaults on the constitution are happening right now in our full gaze, you don’t have to eschew prophesy to predict what post 2016 Uganda will look like!
I predict that there will be a President of Uganda, Mr. Yoweri Kaguta Museveni whose Executive Orders shall have become law. The post 2016 State will have gained remarkable intrusion into private spaces; all our phones and internet conversations will first be transmitted to a nexus situated in the Statehouse. The state shall determine media materials and dose; membership to NRM and not qualification shall determine one’s entrance to the civil service and state employment.
The police will be solving political crimes exclusively, while human rights will be issued by the state and the enjoyment of it will be in the form of a reward or a favor.
Uganda will have no opposition with the exception of State-created dummies to occupy spaces that should have otherwise been occupied by legitimate opposition; prison walls will expand and torture chambers will multiply.
There will be deterioration in infrastructure, mostly roads to slow us down; air, rail and water transportation will remain heavily guarded by the state. All travels, internal or external will be by pre-authorization permit from an agent of the Inspector General of Police. There will be fewer Ugandans participating in the economy as that will undermine their submission to the status quo…
In short, Ugandans will regret why they slept while the country depreciated to this despicable levels.
END
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