One step backwards for the motherland

The country could slip down yet another rung in the ladder of democracy ratings with the looming enactment of a law purportedly designed to regulate public gatherings.

Sadly, but not surprisingly, Inspector General of Police Kale Kayihura on Tuesday got worked up as he referred to this obnoxious Bill at a dialogue, ironically arranged by the Electoral Commission, to discuss how Uganda can have peaceful elections next year.

In its present form, the proposed law will hand his Force dangerous powers to “clear” public gatherings. Countrymen, it is not for nothing that existing legislation has, before this, prudently refrained from lavishing such extraordinary power on an institution with a known propensity for dabbling in political persecution.

Hopefully, Mr Kayihura and Cabinet -- where the draft is being considered -- are still sensible to the provisions of Article 43 of our Constitution which prohibit the limitation of Ugandans’ human rights and freedoms beyond what is acceptable and demonstrably justifiable in a democratic society. Amongst those rights are freedom of assembly and expression. The potential for this law to do just that exists.

There is no guarantee that this Police Force can be trusted to be objective in a matter where it has already demonstrated arbitrariness. Furthermore, the evidence of recent altercations between the Police and the Opposition at public gatherings suggests that half the time police officers attacked politicians who were otherwise carrying on with a legitimate and lawful peaceful demonstration, thereby precipitating a breach of the peace.

It could be the mindset of the Police about how to police crowds. The armed people in police uniform today have been programmed into trigger-happy instruments of suppression as opposed to thinking human beings guided by the mission to keep law and order. An example is presented by Tuesday’s tragic events in Hoima where three workers of British American Tobacco were reportedly shot dead in cold blood by police for the ‘crime’ of staging a sit-down strike over Shs140 million in unpaid dues.

Historically, laws cleverly couched in words like “safeguarding public order” were euphemisms for political persecution. They have included the opprobrious detention without trial laws of the first Obote government which, like other such authoritarian decrees, never stand the test of time because they are illegitimate and an insult to mankind’s natural inclination to freedom.