(Nairobi) – Uganda’s Supreme Court ruling declaring military trials of civilians unconstitutional is a victory for human rights, Human Rights Watch said today.
On January 31, 2025, the Supreme Court held that military courts lack jurisdiction to try civilians and ordered officials to halt all ongoing military trials of civilians and transfer them to the country’s civilian court system, but stopped short of declaring past convictions under the military courts void.
“The Supreme Court’s decision is a major step to protect the right to a fair trial in Uganda,” said Oryem Nyeko, senior Africa researcher at Human Rights Watch. “The Ugandan government should finally ensure justice for the many civilians wrongly convicted under these military trials as well as those awaiting trial.”
For years, military courts have tried hundreds of civilians, including political opponents and government critics. The trials have often fallen short of domestic and international standards, violating the right to a fair trial and freedoms guaranteed by Uganda’s constitution.
The 2005 Uganda Peoples’ Defence Forces (UPDF) Act establishes military courts to try offenses committed by people “subject to military law.” Military officials, who are not required to have legal qualifications, are appointed by a military leadership committee to administer these courts. Under the UPDF Act, the court may sentence a person to death.
Human Rights Watch found in 2011 that the trials of hundreds of civilians convicted by these courts for alleged armed crime and cattle rustling in the northeastern Karamoja subregion did not meet international standards of competence, independence, and impartiality, and routinely violated the right of accused people to present a defense as well as their right against self-incrimination. There were also credible allegations of torture of accused people.
Ordinary Ugandan courts have on several occasions ruled against the trial of civilians by court martial, including in 2021, when the Constitutional Court ruling found the provisions of the UPDF Act that allow for military trials of civilians unconstitutional.
Despite this, the Ugandan authorities have continued to use military courts to prosecute and arbitrarily detain civilians, particularly political opposition leaders and supporters and government critics. They include, recently, an opposition leader, Kizza Besigye, who is facing trial at the General Court Martial in Makindye, Kampala.
In October 2024, the General Court Martial in Makindye, Kampala, sentenced 16 civilian supporters of Uganda’s main opposition party, the National Unity Platform (NUP), to five years in prison. The group pled guilty to charges of “treachery” and possession of explosive devices. They were part of a group of 32 opposition supporters who had spent over three years in pretrial detention and over a year on trial.
In November, the authorities released 19 NUP supporters after President Yoweri Museveni pardoned them. At least nine other party supporters, who did not plead guilty, remain imprisoned. Olivia Lutaale, one of the accused, told the media that she chose to plead guilty to secure her release after years of imprisonment without trial.
Critics of the military trials of civilians, including lawyers, have faced harassment and arrests.
On January 7, 2025, a military court sentenced Besigye’s lawyer, Eron Kiiza, to nine months in prison without a trial or legal representation for contempt of court following an altercation in the court. A witness told Human Rights Watch that the soldiers beat Kiiza after he protested being blocked from an area of the court. Kiiza has been openly critical of military trials of civilians.
On January 9, police in Kampala arrested seven activists as they attempted to march to the Supreme Court to protest the trial of Kiiza and other civilians in the Court Martial, and charged them with being a “nuisance.”
President Museveni has expressed support for military trials of civilians, saying that civilian courts were failing to secure convictions of those accused of violent crimes quickly.
Both Uganda’s constitution and international law guarantee the right to a fair trial.
International legal standards consider trying civilians in military courts, in principle, to be incompatible with the right to a fair trial, and in particular the right to be tried before an independent and impartial tribunal. The African Commission on Human and Peoples’ Rights has also emphasized that military courts should not have jurisdiction over civilians in any circumstances whatsoever.
Following the Supreme Court’s decision, the Ugandan authorities should promptly review all cases involving the wrongful detention and prosecution of civilians before military courts and ensure effective remedies for all defendants, Human Rights Watch said.
Such a remedy should include releasing those detained awaiting trial or as a result of a conviction and providing for the possibility of retrial respecting international fair trial standards and time served. The authorities should also credibly investigate the allegations of abuse of civilian military detainees and hold those responsible for these abuses accountable.
“The Ugandan authorities have for years misused military courts to crack down on opponents and critics,” Nyeko said. “This ruling is an important step toward accountability and justice.”