Under the Non-Governmental Organizations Registration Statute, in force since 1989, all NGOs must obtain official registration before they can operate legally in Uganda. NGOs are defined under the act's Article 13 as any body "established to provide voluntary services including religious, educational, scientific, social or charitable services to the community or any part thereof". The act established a National Board for Non-Governmental Organizations (hereafter the NGO board) with the power to grant or refuse registration, and to revoke registration once granted if the board deems it "in the public interest to do so."22 The NGO board is located at the Ministry of Internal Affairs and its members are appointed by the minister. They are mostly officials of different government ministries, 23 but they include representatives of Uganda's internal and external security services, the Internal and External Security Organizations (ISO and ESO). There are also two members of the public appointed to sit on the board, but it includes no NGO representatives. Appeals against NGO board decisions can be made to the minister of internal affairs, but there is no provision for judicial oversight or challenge to the board's decisions.
NGOs that seek to operate without first obtaining official registration contravene the law and are liable to a fine of up to two hundred thousand shillings (approximately U.S. $120). Failure to pay such fine can result in those responsible for the management of the organization being imprisoned for up to one year.24
The NGO board's powers are extensive. In granting registration, it can specify "conditions or directions" for the NGO concerning its "operations" (a term that is not defined in the law), where it may carry out its activities, and its staffing. Once registration has been granted, the NGO board has further powers enabling it to "guide and monitor organizations in carrying out their services," and to summarily revoke an NGO's registration if the NGO is considered to have contravened any of the "conditions or directions" that the NGO board set when approving its registration.
The current law provides for an excessive degree of state control and interference in the activities of NGOs. The mandatory registration requirement means that the government, through the NGO board, has full powers to determine which NGOs are permitted to operate. NGOs that wish to engage in legitimate activities within the community can be prevented from doing so legally, if the government disapproves of them, by being refused registration. NGOs may also be required to carry on their activities under conditions or in locations not of their choosing, or not to employ or to dismiss particular individuals, such as known government critics or opponents, from their staff. Or, having obtained registration, NGOs may be summarily closed down on ill-defined grounds of "public interest" by order of the NGO board. In such case, the NGO board is not even required to provide detailed reasons or disclose evidence in support of its decision to revoke registration, and the NGO is denied recourse to the courts or an independent judicial body, being permitted to appeal only to the minister responsible for appointing the NGO board.
The perception that NGOs that have obtained registration may be subject to continuous and potentially intrusive monitoring by the state is heightened by the presence of state security representatives on the NGO board. This, understandably, may lead NGOs to exercise a degree of self-censorship, including on important issues of public concern. Under the twin threat of surveillance and de-registration, it would be surprising if some NGOs at least did not feel obliged to adopt more cautious policies and practices than they would wish, and to steer clear of activities that, while entirely legitimate, could be controversial or politically sensitive, and incur government displeasure.
Under international law, states may restrict freedom of association only on certain prescribed grounds such as to uphold national security or public order or to protect public health or morals, and then only in particular circumstances. But no such restraints are reflected in Uganda's NGO law. On the contrary, that law's vague and widely drawn provisions allow the Ugandan authorities to impose curbs on freedom of association that breach international law and its treaty obligations under the ICCPR, and to block NGO activities that pose no threat to national security, public order or other legitimate areas of protection.
Another problematic area of the current law is that of punishment. In Article 1 (7), the law states that registration can be revoked when an NGO "contravenes any of the conditions or directions inserted in the Certificate" of registration. It authorizes up to a year in prison for "an officer concerned in the management of the Organization" if the NGO fails to pay its fine, without any explicit requirement of proof that that officer was in some way responsible for the organization's failure to pay the fine or for the alleged violation of the law.
23 Article 3(2). It includes representatives of the Ministries of Internal Affairs, Relief and Social Rehabilitation, Justice, Land and Surveys, Planning and Economic Development, Finance, Foreign Affairs, Local Government, from the Office of the Minister of State for Women in Development in the President's Office, and the Office of the Prime Minister.