District of Wakiso, Uganda – the Supreme Court of Uganda ruled in January that prosecution by civilians in the military courts were unconstitutional. When this happened, Ann was ecstatic.
Her brother was four years old in pre -trial detention. For her, the decision meant that it would be free in a few days. He had been tried several times before the General Court of Uganda, a military court, for betrayal and illegal possession of ammunition. It was set for another trial on a date to be expected. Ann, who asked Global Press Journal to use only his first name for fear of prosecution, says that allegations against him are false. Everything he did, she said, was an express support for Bobi Wine, a key Ugandan politician and a member of the country’s opposition party.
The decision of the Supreme Court canceled the practice of civil trials in the military courts with immediate effect.
The decision “looked like a extinct of long years of thirst for my brother,” says Ann.
But since then, only the head of the opposition Kizza Besigye, who was to undergo a military trial, has been officially reassigned to a civil court and accused of betrayal.
There is little hope that many less known cases, many of which imply accusations of armed robbery and possession of weapons, will escape the military courts as the government insists on military jurisdiction over some of these affairs, despite the disapproval of the Supreme Court. Even if the authorities launch the transfer to civil courts, the process could take years.
A government report in February 2024 shows that 264 people were detained in pre -trial detention before military courts. Global Press Journal contacted Johnson Byabashaija, general Ugandan commissioner of prisons, for the last figures. He did not respond to the request. But George Musisi, a lawyer based in Kampala, says that around 2,000 civilians are held in pre -trial detention under various martial courts.
Even if the government implements the Supreme Court decision, many of these people will remain stuck, says Musisi. They could have asked for the surety before the military court, but this court no longer had jurisdiction over business. And the civil courts do not yet have the files of the detained persons, so they cannot request a deposit there either. The whole process could take months, even years, he says.
The families of the accused are frustrated, and this feeling only deepens that President Yoweri Museveni, in an article on his account X, described the court’s decision to “evil”, adding that the trial of civilians in the military court was for him to protect the Ugandans from “criminals armed with firearms”.
Museveni’s criticisms say that many of those who are arrested are opponents of his government, and that trying them before the military courts is a means for the president to consolidate power after almost four decades in power. The army now manages public construction, occupies seats in Parliament and plays major roles in government. The son of Museveni is the country’s defense forces.
Military courts are only a other practical means for crushing dissent, explains Nkunyingi Muwada, an opposition deputy. They make the state auction in a way that civil courts would not do it.
In February, Amnesty International condemned the militarization of the country’s judicial system and called on the Ugandan authorities to release key opposition members who, according to him, was illegally detained.
Henry Byansi, human rights lawyer and program director in Chapter four, a non -profit organization focused on civil freedoms, said that ignorance of the court’s decision is an abuse of the Constitution and the Outline in the Tribunal. The authorities responsible for the implementation of the decision – the country’s attorney general and the director of public prosecution – should have act immediately, he said.
But the Minister of Justice and Constitutional Affairs, Norbert Mao, said during a parliamentary session that the public should not be misleading by the decision. It was not a liberation order, he said, but an order to bring prisoners to the good court.
“We must not excite the public that he should be released,” he said.
Musa, who asked that only his family name be used, says that his brother is a supporter of the national unity platform, the main political party opposition in Uganda. In 2021, civilian clothing men arrested his brother at his home in a suburb of Kampala. His brother was charged to a military court for betrayal and illegal possession of ammunition of intention to overthrow the government. Musa says that these accusations are baseless. Since then, his brother, the father of two, has been in pre -trial detention.
“The delayed liberation of my brother and his friends is denied justice,” explains Musa.