Civil society must push back on shrinking political space
A free, active and open civil society is a precursor and an important indicator of the extent of a democracy in any country. This is because Civil Society fulfil important duties of checking exercise of power by those with authority, monitor, influence and hold the government and leaders accountable to their actions and inactions towards societal welfare and justice for the most vulnerable.
However, civil society can only thrive where freedom of speech and right of free assembly are guaranteed, respected and promoted. Yet, in recent years, there has been an alarming rise on restrictions on the right to opinion, association and assembly in Uganda.
This is happening via a range of measures, including legal and extra-legal means that impose excessive red tape limitations on civil society operations and a narrative that delegitimise and criminalise dissent.
Three weeks ago, media was awash with a letter from the government’s Financial Intelligence Authority (FIA), demanding the Equity Bank to release bank records and financial transactions for 13 non-government organisations (NGOs). FIA was established by the act of Parliament, to fight money laundering and terror financing.
In the same period, the Ministry for Internal Affairs announced that all organisations must go through an onerous process to “validate” their registrations with the NGO bureau. The verification form seeks to get information about the NGOs including sources of funding, banks details and sensitive information for staff employed by these organisations including their salaries and other personal information.
While some of these exercises might have some legitimate reasons, Civil Society is concerned that this is part of a worrying trend in which NGOs, particularly those working on governance, democracy and accountability, are being targeted through baseless investigations which are neither fair nor transparent.
In February this year, police issued a letter to several civil society organisations in which they claimed to be developing a database of NGOs. One of the questions they asked was whether the organisations were involved in elections.
In September 2017, Uganda Police raided Action Aid Uganda’s offices and those of three partner NGOs that engaged in the constitutional reforms on Article 102 (b) on lifting presidential age limit and article 26 on compulsory land acquisition. They confiscated personal phones, laptops and institutional documents in search of evidence of alleged money laundering. Simultaneously, the Bank of Uganda and Financial Intelligence Authority froze AAIU’s bank accounts for three months.
Two years on, the police and state agencies have neither released an investigation report, nor returned confiscated property, despite written requests for them to do so.
While the Bank of Uganda confirmed in writing that Action Aid Uganda has been cleared of the allegations, but government has not closed the case, nor has it publicly cleared the organisation of any fault. On the contrary, individuals in government are increasingly using negative messaging to demonise NGOs and portray them as agents of foreign political interests.
The above scenarios clearly demonstrate how hostile the operating environment for civil society organisations in Uganda has become, especially those working on human rights, anti-corruption, political governance, land rights, natural resources, minerals or environmental issues.
While the current trend is not unique to NGOs, the onslaught is likely to worsen, especially as the political tempo heightens towards 2021 elections. This wont be unique to NGOs but also other pro-democracy groups and other formations advancing social justice including media, religious leaders. The challenge is to look at this phenomenon as an issue of selected governance NGOs who apply what doesn’t seem to fit within the defined rules of engagement. Shrinking political space should rather be conceived in a wider lens of an attack on democracy and dissent and it should be understood as a sector wide problem.
The shrinking space in Uganda is fundamentally, and unavoidably, a political one. It is about the dwindling level of democracy and growing level of intolerance to dissent and an on-going struggle to negotiate the limits of political power and its interaction with the citizenry that must be constantly pursued politically.
The effects of the narrowing space demonise NGOs and portray civil society as agents of foreign political interests that erodes public trust in foreign development and humanitarian agencies, regardless of their area of work, resulting in a tendency for vilification to spread to the whole of civil society. This therefore creates risk not only for NGOs that are speaking the hard truth to power but the sector.
Further the imposition of burdensome administrative requirements is already severely hamper NGOs operational work. This includes geographical limitations on where civil society including humanitarian organisations are allowed to operate; restrictions on NGOs’ ability to engage in or support policy advocacy; limiting the kind of work agencies can carry out on pre approved activities; preventing access to particular groups of people; imposing travel restrictions; and harassing local staff.
Civil Society, civic activist groups, prodemocracy groups and donors must therefore engage a multifaced joint strategy to push back on this trend instead of merely acting safe. NGOs must make the painful choice of either keeping true to their mission of justice and defend the rights of those who may not the space they occupy to be or chose to survive as any other Ugandans in the face of injustice, human rights abuses and declining democracy.
Taking the easy and comfortable approach of acting safe will make current civil society formations less relevant to the realities of the day. The good news, however, is that the citizens will always organise and find alternative ways of creating relevant formations that can advance their struggles for social justice and realisation of a dignified life.
Part of the push back should entail dialogue with those in authority to appreciate the value of civil society in deepening democracy and accountability, countering negative propaganda against NGOs that and thinking outside the box to find alternative ways of engaging in a hostile environment.
Civil Society needs to proactively develop and draw strategy defend its image by telling its own story that protects its image and its role in deepening democracy. This should not only reach civil society but especially the general public especially on the positive contribution of civic space to building peaceful, stable societies, including inclusive and sustainable economic growth.
The messaging should enable realisation by the citizenry that an attack on Civil Society and independent media is intended to silence their voices and limit their rights to freely organise and challenge abuse and misuse of power by those in authority by criminalising activism and dissent
Further, NGOs and the broader civil society must strengthen their resilience to withstand the attacks through better collaboration, prediction of the realities ahead and adjusting their ways of operation to enable them deliver on their mandate in a complex and fragile political landscape.
The writer is the Manager Democratic Governance at Action Aid Uganda
