The Minister of Justice and Constitutional Affairs, Norbert Mao, has implored civil society organisations in the country not to mix human rights advocacy with political activism.
Giving a keynote address during the fifth Human Rights Convention 2023 at Golf Course Hotel in Kampala yesterday, Mao said the Government has since discovered that some political actors are using human rights challenges as a tool to cause political change in Uganda.
He said some actors have gone an extra mile of sponsoring protests for purposes of provoking the Government and security agencies to cause the attention of the world powers.
The two-day convention was organised by Chapter Four Uganda in partnership with the Konrad Adenauer Stiftung (KAS), a German political party foundation associated with but independent of the centre-right Christian Democratic Union.
Mao said human rights violation is not a policy of the ruling National Resistance Movement (NRM) Government and it is determined to fight the vice.
Responding to the German ambassador’s demands for the November 2020 riots report in which over 50 people were killed by stray bullets as a group of citizens were protesting against the arrest of former presidential candidate Robert Kyagulanyi, Mao said it will soon be released.
Mao said while civil society organisations in the country are seemingly under attack, democracy cannot depend on the Government or state alone, noting that organised citizens are the lifeblood of democracy.
