Security forces without shame and in total disregard to their loyalty to the Constitution have become partisan. How? First, they have clearly labelled all journalists who don’t work for state media as opposition journalists. And therefore, this means that security operatives are regime agents or appendages.
In that regard anyone who works contrary to regime interests directly infringes on their personal interests. The panacea to this conflict of interest in their view is to shot, kill or maim journalists. Journalists on election campaign beats are clearly identified by their media houses, and are dressed in vests and helmets emblazoned with “press” marks.
Two, the cameras cannot match guns. Why do you use a lethal weapon to restrain a journalist or any unarmed person? The army and police have arrogated themselves the duty to end lives!
It appears the regime security operatives know that to silence journalists is to silence the voices of all those who speak through the media, or who might be tempted to speak in future. The media have covered and kept a lot of footage of the atrocities committed by police and the army.
And it seems there’s a contrived plot to suppress anymore coverage. But if you know your actions are lawful, why then are you afraid of exposure? Courageous journalists play a critical role in defending democracy. They are offering some check on power.
They are the people to whom citizens turn to when police and courts and political institutions fail them. They inform citizens about what is really happening. Matters are not helped by the partisan Ugandan Media Council and Uganda Communications Commission (UCC)!
These two institutions survive on taxpayers’ money. These institutions ought to care about the growth and survival of the media in the country. Unfortunately, because they are partisan, they only care when the regime is bruised. The Media Council in particular has become very draconian in its efforts to regulate the media.
Even before it puts its house in order, it has embarked on censorship of the media. They now require all local journalists covering the elections to be licensed and accredited by it. They set December 30, 2020, as the registration deadline. Some media houses have resisted this unfair approach.
The duty to register journalists falls on the defunct National Institute of Journalist Union (NIJU). There are many forces against the progress of the media and the value of life.
UCC is arbitrarily deactivating and deleting National Unity Platform (NUP) YouTube video channels, claiming they violated national laws. Forgetting that it too is infringing on NUP property. It appears the media will remain a target as long as the physical attackers (army, police) and the institutional ones (Media Council and UCC) get away with it.
We need to pursue and prosecute killers…But without sustained pressure those responsible for journalists’ deaths will go unpunished, and more journalists will die.