a. Arbitrary Deprivation of Life and Other Unlawful or Politically Motivated Killings

There were several reports that the government or its agents committed arbitrary or unlawful killings. The law provides for several agencies to investigate, inquire into, and or prosecute unlawful killings by the security forces. Human rights campaigners, however, claimed these agencies were largely ineffective. The constitution established the Uganda Human Rights Commission (UHRC) to investigate any person or group of persons for abuses of any human right (see section 5). The Police Disciplinary Court has the power to hear cases of officers who breach the police disciplinary code of conduct. Military courts have the power to hear cases against officers that break military law, which bars soldiers from targeting or killing nonmilitants.

Opposition activists, local media, and human rights activists reported that security forces killed some individuals the government identified as dissidents and those whom it accused of terrorism. On March 13, local media reported that National Unity Platform (NUP) opposition party member Fabian Luuk died at Kiruddu hospital from injuries he sustained during torture while in detention. NUP leaders alleged that military officers arrested Luuka and three others at a checkpoint in Luweero District, after they discovered the four carrying NUP membership cards, while traveling to Jinja district to work as laborers at a sugarcane plantation. According to NUP leaders, military personnel beat the four individuals, killing two of them, Agodri Azori and Obindu, before abandoning Luuka at Nakawa food market in Kampala. The fourth victim, hailing from Terego County, remained unaccounted for. Local media reported that images of Luuka’s body showed “electrocution and burn marks to his arms and legs, severe necrosis of his thigh and legs, along with apparent rotting of tissue.” On March 11, the outgoing Speaker of Parliament Rebecca Kadaga stated she had directed parliament’s Committee on Human Rights to investigate Luuka’s death, but the committee had not released a report by year’s end.

Police killed some persons violating COVID-19 curfew regulations. On June 28, local media reported that police arrested Abdrashid Walujjo, one of its officers, after he shot and killed 13-year-old Ester Naula on her way from buying street food after curfew. Police stated Walujjo would be prosecuted for murder, but his trial had not started by year’s end.

Hazing was a common practice in detention facilities and sometimes resulted in death. On July 14, local media reported that Joe Okot Otara, an inmate at Anaka Prison in Nwoya District, died while working alongside fellow inmates at a private farm. Police told local media that a postmortem found Otara died of “cardiac arrest, which resulted from a coronary artery occlusion.” The postmortem, however, noted that Otara bore bruises “on the left clavicle, chest, abdomen, both knees and legs as well as on the anterior plane of the body.” Local media reported that a former fellow inmate said that upon arriving at the farm, four inmate prefects, with encouragement and support from prison wardens, started beating the new inmates working at the farm, including Otara, and left him for dead. According to local media, the former detainee reported that prison wardens surnamed Dratia, Ogwang, and Mazoro ordered hazing for new inmates. The Anaka prison commander, Isaac Aruo, however, denied allegations of torture and said Otara sustained his injuries from a seizure he experienced before death.

b. Disappearance

There were numerous reports of disappearances by government authorities. Local media, opposition political parties, cultural leaders, human rights lawyers, and religious leaders reported that the military – particularly the Chieftaincy for Military Intelligence (CMI) and the Special Forces Command (SFC) – and police used unmarked Toyota Hiace vans, locally known as “drones,” to kidnap hundreds of NUP supporters in the periods before, during, and after the January 14 general election, and detained them without charge at unidentified locations. On March 4, the NUP released a list of 423 supporters who had gone missing after abductions by security agencies. Authorities released inconsistent information regarding the number of missing NUP supporters. On February 4, outgoing Minister for Internal Affairs Jeje Odongo stated the government was investigating allegations of the kidnapping of 44 NUP supporters, 31 of whom could not be traced. On March 4, Odongo denied allegations of disappearances by security agencies and declared the agencies had arrested and charged 222 individuals in connection with protests in November 2020. On March 7, President Museveni stated CMI had detained “177 suspects who were either granted bail by court or released,” and was still then holding another 65 suspects, while SFC had detained 68 suspects in Kampala, Kyotera, Mpigi, Mukono, and Nakasongola Districts. Museveni added, “The disappearances were a consequence of the essentially treasonable acts of elements of the opposition” and “their foreign backers who wanted to install a quisling regime in Uganda.” According to local media reports, security agencies released some of the missing persons, but NUP leaders reported that hundreds of NUP supporters remained missing at year’s end. Numerous NUP supporters released by the security agencies told local media that they experienced torture at the hands of security officers, who dumped the NUP supporters by the roadside in swamps, thickets, and forests upon their release.

c. Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman, or Degrading Treatment or Punishment

The constitution and law prohibit such practices. The law stipulates that any person convicted of an act of torture may receive a sentence of 15 years’ imprisonment, a monetary fine, or both. The penalty for conviction of aggravated torture is life imprisonment. Nevertheless, there were credible reports security forces tortured and physically abused suspects. Impunity was a problem.

Human rights organizations, opposition politicians, and local media reported that security agencies tortured suspects as well as dissidents to extract self-incriminating confessions and as punishment for their opposition to the government, leading to several deaths. According to media reports, numerous NUP supporters released from detention by the security forces reported that security officers shot them in the legs, beat them with sticks and batons on their joints, and pulled out their toenails using pliers, while simultaneously ordering them to confess to participating in plots to burn fuel stations in Kampala. NUP member and local government official Cyrus Samba Kasato told local media on March 2 that CMI officers tied him by his hands to suspend him with his feet off the ground and then beat and slapped him for refusing to support the National Resistance Movement (NRM) government.

Local media reported that hazing was a common practice in prisons and sometimes resulted in death.

Lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer, and intersex (LGBTQI+) activists reported that police officers and medical personnel carried out forced anal examinations on members of the LGBTQI+ community whom they arrested at what was alleged to be a same-sex engagement ceremony (see section 6, Acts of Violence, Criminalization, and Other Abuses Based on Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity).

Local media reported that security forces beat some persons while enforcing regulations to combat the COVID-19 pandemic. On June 6, the president announced renewed restrictions to combat the COVID-19 pandemic, which included an indefinite closure of all schools, a ban on religious gatherings, restrictions on interdistrict public and private transport, and a closure of nonessential business, which he would later expand to include a ban on all nonessential travel and a night-time curfew. The president instructed police and the military to enforce the regulations. Local media reported several incidents in which police and military officers indiscriminately beat persons they found outside after the nighttime curfew with sticks, batons, and gunstocks, maiming some and killing others. On June 28, local media reported that Monica Musenero, the minister in the office of the president in charge of science, technology, and innovation, instructed the resident district commissioner of Butebo District to “spank” and “beat” persons breaching COVID-19 restrictions.

Impunity was a problem, and it was widespread in police, the military, the prisons service, and the executive branch. The security forces did not take adequate measures to investigate and bring to account officers implicated in human rights abuses, especially in incidents involving members of the political opposition. Authorities encouraged and gave political and judicial cover to officials who committed human rights abuses. Security agencies did not take timely or adequate steps to investigate the November 2020 security force killings of unarmed civilians. When a BBC investigation identified two official vehicles whose occupants were responsible for some of the killings, police officers instead summoned the journalists who reported the story for questioning, arguing they incited violence. While addressing a press conference on January 8, the Inspector General of Police, Martin Okoth Ochola, told journalists that police officers would continue beating journalists who insisted on covering violent protests “for their own safety.” The president gave contradictory public messages regarding human rights abuses; although he condemned arbitrary arrests, acts of torture, and cruel and inhuman treatment by the security agencies in a televised speech on August 14, he also commended the security forces for arbitrary arrests and disappearances on March 7. The president also stated that he had led a training session on February 15 with SFC officers in which he taught them to exercise restraint while enforcing crowd control measures, including not shooting at “rioters” except if the rioter threatened a civilian’s life.

d. Arbitrary Arrest or Detention

Although the law prohibits arbitrary arrest and detention, security forces often arbitrarily arrested and detained persons, especially opposition leaders, politicians, activists, demonstrators, journalists, LGBTQI+ persons, and members of the general population accused of violating COVID-19 restrictions. The law provides for the right of persons to challenge the lawfulness of their arrest or detention in court, but this mechanism was seldom employed and rarely successful.

e. Denial of Fair Public Trial

The constitution and law provide for an independent judiciary, but the government did not always respect this provision. Corruption, understaffing, inefficiency, and executive branch interference with judicial rulings often undermined the courts’ independence. Human rights activists and local media reported that on several occasions, security agencies defied court orders to release detainees or arraign persons they detained without charge, and that security agents intimidated judicial officers from making rulings that granted reprieve to political detainees. The activists also reported that due to a lack of judicial independence, the judiciary unnecessarily delayed human rights petitions by denying them hearing dates or prolonging the hearing sessions.

The president appoints Supreme Court justices, Court of Appeal and High Court judges, and members of the Judicial Service Commission (which makes recommendations on appointments to the judiciary) with the approval of parliament.

Due to vacancies on the Supreme Court, Court of Appeal, High Court, and the lower courts, the judiciary did not deliver justice in a timely manner. At times the lack of a judicial quorum precluded cases from proceeding.

Judicial corruption was a problem, and local media reported numerous cases where judicial officers in lower courts solicited and accepted bribes from the parties involved.

The constitution and law prohibit such actions, but there were reports the government failed to respect these prohibitions. There were reports that government authorities entered homes without judicial or other appropriate authorization; accessed, collected, or used private communications or personal data arbitrarily or without appropriate legal authority; implemented regulations and practices that allow for the arbitrary or unlawful interference with privacy, including the use of technology arbitrarily or unlawfully to surveil or interfere with the privacy of individuals; and used technologies and practices including internet and social media controls, blocking or filtering of websites and social media platforms, sensors, biometric data collection, and data analytics. The law authorizes government security agencies to tap private conversations to combat terrorism-related offenses. The government invoked the law to monitor telephone and internet communications.

Killings: On August 14, the president reported that the country’s soldiers serving in the African Union Mission in Somalia had carried out retaliatory killings against an unspecified number of Somalis after their unit suffered casualties in an ambush. The president declared a military court would charge and prosecute the officers, and on November 13, local media reported the court, while sitting in Mogadishu, had found five soldiers guilty of murder and sentenced two of them to death and three of them to 39 years in prison.

In February the International Criminal Court found former Lord’s Resistance Army commander Dominic Ongwen guilty of war crimes and crimes against humanity committed in the northern part of the country from July 1, 2002, to December 31, 2005. In May the court sentenced Ongwen to 25 years’ imprisonment.

The law provides citizens the ability to choose their government through free and fair periodic elections held by secret ballot and based on universal and equal suffrage. The law also allows authorities to carry out elections for local government officials by having voters line up behind their preferred candidate or the candidate’s representative, portrait, or symbol. Serious irregularities marred the 2021 presidential and parliamentary elections, including exclusion and intimidation of political opposition members and independent media, significant and widespread voting irregularities, enforced disappearance of opposition political supporters, and violence by security forces.

Elections and Political Participation

Recent Elections: During the year the country held its sixth presidential and legislative elections since President Museveni came to power in 1986. The Electoral Commission (EC) announced the president was re-elected with 58.4 percent of the vote, and NUP candidate Robert Kyagulanyi finished second with 35.1 percent. The ruling NRM party captured approximately 63.5 percent of the seats in the 529-member unicameral parliament. There were numerous irregularities in the lead up to, during, and immediate aftermath of the elections. The East African Community Observation Mission reported concerns regarding the EC’s inability to register all eligible voters, a “disproportionate use of force in some instances and accusations of biased enforcement against opposition parties and candidates,” and “actions taken against opposition parties and candidates when it came to accessing [broadcast journalism].” The group also raised concerns regarding the EC’s failure to deliver “timely accreditation and issuance of accreditation documents to domestic observers.” Authorities harassed and blocked some domestic independent election observers from observing the electoral process and limited the number of some foreign and diplomatic election observation missions. On January 13, government spokesperson Ofwono Opondo told local media that the government limited the number of accredited observers. Authorities on January 13 also shut down the internet for five days.

On election day, January 14, police officers raided a civil society election data center and arrested 27 NGO staff and volunteers on what a police spokesperson said were suspicions that the staffers had “ulterior motives, which might incite violence in this country.” Local media reported on January 27 that police had released all 27 without charge. Local media reported numerous incidents of ballot stuffing and showed several videos of individuals wearing military and police uniforms premarking and stuffing ballots. Police detained Kyagulanyi at his home between January 14 and January 25. Due to election disputes stemming from previous elections, in 2016 the Supreme Court recommended changes to electoral laws to increase fairness, including campaign finance reform and equal access for all candidates to state-owned media. The government had not yet enacted laws to comply with these recommendations.

Political Parties and Political Participation: Opposition parties reported that security agencies interfered with party operations and arbitrarily arrested and detained opposition leaders and intimidated and beat their supporters, ostensibly to prevent incitement to violence (see sections 1.a., 1.c., and 1.d.).

On January 5, local media reported that FM radio stations in the Teso subregion had denied access to at least five opposition presidential candidates during the election campaign. On January 18, local media and the NUP reported that police and military officers sealed off the party’s secretariat, which according to the party prevented any staffers from accessing it, thereby disorganizing the party’s preparations for a legal challenge to the election results. According to local media, a police spokesperson said, “It’s not a siege but simply a security operation to neutralize threats that were detected.” On the same day, police officers enforced a blockade at Kyagulanyi’s home, preventing his lawyers from entering so he could not record a statement in preparation for his presidential election petition. Local media reported on February 16 that security officers had vacated the NUP secretariat’s premises. Opposition political parties reported that security officers and executives at government-controlled media blocked opposition politicians from accessing media houses.

Participation of Women and Members of Minority Groups: No law limits the participation of women or members of minority groups in the political process, and they did participate. The law mandates affirmative action seats in parliament and in local government councils be reserved for women, youth, senior citizens, and persons with disabilities, and the government implemented the law effectively. On June 8, President Museveni appointed the country’s first female prime minister, Robinah Nabbanja. Cultural factors, high costs, and sexual harassment, however, limited women’s ability to run for political office. Female activists reported the official fees required to secure a nomination to run for elected office were prohibitively high and prevented most women from running for election. Activists reported violence and harassment committed by members of the security agencies discouraged women from turning up to cast their ballots, so many preferred to stay in the safety of their homes. Activists reported that the number of women legislators holding open seats dwindled because of the affirmative action policy, which reserved a legislative position for women in each district. They reported that internal political party processes locked women out of contesting for open seats, limiting them to affirmative action seats. Activists also reported that media coverage mocked and trivialized women candidates as well as perpetuated the inequality and subordination of women.