There are moments when a lawyer must speak not because he has been personally wronged, but because a principle larger than any individual is beginning to look vulnerable.
The reported warning by General Muhoozi Kainerugaba to The Observer is one such moment.
“Observer is Ssemujju’s newspaper, isn’t it? Let me see how they behave.”
It is a short sentence. But words acquire a different weight depending on who speaks them. When they come from an ordinary citizen, they may be dismissed as bluster. When they come from a serving Chief of Defence Forces, they inevitably carry the shadow of institutional power.
That is why I would respectfully urge General Muhoozi: please keep off the press. This is not a plea that newspapers should be above criticism. They are not. Journalists make mistakes. Editors can be unfair. Newspapers can publish opinions with which readers profoundly disagree. They can even be biased.
But these are precisely the circumstances for which a constitutional democracy provides lawful remedies.
If a newspaper publishes a falsehood, correct it. If it defames you, sue it. If it breaches a professional standard, complain to the mandated regulatory authority. If its arguments are wrong, defeat them with better arguments and facts.
What should concern us is the movement from “this publication is wrong” to “let me see how this newspaper behaves.”
The latter introduces something different into the relationship between power and the press: uncertainty. And uncertainty can become intimidation.
A journalist does not have to be arrested before becoming cautious. An editor does not have to receive a summons before beginning to wonder whether a particular story is worth the trouble. A publisher does not have to be shut down before calculating the possible consequences of publishing an uncomfortable truth.
Sometimes the mere knowledge that someone powerful is watching is enough. Uganda has already seen how quickly words about the press can become more than words.
On 28 June this year, General Muhoozi ordered the shutdown of Daily Monitor and NTV and wrote on X: “In Uganda, I DO NOT believe in a free press.” He further stated that the outlets would not reopen without his permission. Military personnel were subsequently deployed at Nation Media Group premises.
That troubling history comes to mind when we hear a new warning directed at another newspaper.
It would therefore be unfortunate if the latest words were dismissed as merely another episode in the familiar theatre of political argument. The Observer has every right to publish criticism of General Muhoozi, just as General Muhoozi has every right to criticise The Observer.
And neither side should be operating under the shadow of coercion and intimidation.
I have written for The Observer. It has published my criticism of the exercise of public power, including my recent article, Sovereign Lawlessness: The Constitutional Crisis Confronting Uganda. It has also provided space for Yusuf Serunkuma and other writers to subject the exercise of public power to criticism.
That is not evidence that The Observer is right about everything. It is evidence of something more important: a newspaper is supposed to be a place where arguments are allowed to collide.
Some of those arguments may be uncomfortable and disagreeable. That is fine. The irony is that General Muhoozi’s complaint about media bias can itself be answered by the existence of a free press.
If a newspaper is biased against you, let it publish its bias. Let you publish your response. Let another newspaper publish a contrary view. Let citizens read all of it and make their own judgments.
That is infinitely healthier than having an official decide which stories are permissible.
Our Constitution settled this question rather clearly. Article 29(1)(a) protects freedom of speech and expression, expressly including freedom of the press and other media.
Article 43 permits limitations on rights only within a constitutional framework, including the requirement that restrictions be acceptable and demonstrably justifiable in a free and democratic society.
Even where national security is invoked, that constitutional test does not disappear; national security cannot become a blank cheque for arbitrary interference with the press. The Supreme Court has applied that constitutional test directly to restrictions on expression.
In Charles Onyango-Obbo and Another v Attorney General, the Supreme Court struck down the offence of publishing “false news” as an unconstitutional restriction on freedom of expression. The Court held that the restriction was vague and overbroad, and warned against restrictions that create a chilling effect on freedom of expression and the press.
That case is particularly instructive today because the journalists before the Court were Monitor journalists—Charles Onyango-Obbo and Andrew Mwenda.
Uganda’s constitutional jurisprudence on press freedom therefore did not arise from an abstract academic exercise. It arose from a real confrontation between journalists, the State and the limits of governmental power.
That history should make all of us careful.
I say this as a lawyer who has spent more than three decades dealing with the law, as someone who has served inside government and Parliament, and as someone who has himself twice taken Government to court and written critically about the exercise of public power.
I have no difficulty with a powerful person being criticised. Nor do I believe that critics are always right. But constitutionalism is not about protecting only those who are right.
It is about ensuring that the wrong person can still speak, the unpopular argument can still be published, and the powerful can still be challenged without the challenger first having to calculate the consequences of displeasing the powerful.
That is why the release of Hon. Muhammad Muwanga Kivumbi on 29 September 2026 is worth remembering. Whatever disagreements we may have with him or any other political actor, liberty is safest when disputes are resolved through law rather than discretionary power.
The same principle applies to newspapers. If The Observer has crossed a legal line, General Muhoozi does not need to teach it a lesson. The law already knows how to deal with offending publications.
And if the newspaper has merely published an argument he dislikes, then the answer is even simpler: write back. If not personally, let an authorised spokesperson do it.
Defeat the argument.
Give the public your facts.
Persuade the readers.
That is what political and intellectual contestation is supposed to look like.
There is another reason I respectfully ask General Muhoozi to keep off the press.
He is not merely another political commentator. He is the serving head of the country’s armed forces. The institutional asymmetry between a military commander and a newspaper editor is enormous. Even an apparently casual warning can therefore be heard differently by those on the receiving end.
The media market is tough. Many media houses are struggling. Others have wound up. They do not need the additional burden of big-stick intimidation.
Power has a responsibility to understand its own weight. The freedom of the press is not a licence for journalists to act irresponsibly. But neither is criticism of the press a licence for those who wield state power to intimidate it.
A free press can be noisy. It can be irritating. It can be wrong. It can be partisan. It can publish things that infuriate those in power.
But the alternative is much more dangerous: a press that learns to ask not “Is this true and in the public interest?” but “Will this offend someone powerful?”
That is the moment journalism begins to die—not necessarily with a newspaper’s closure, but with the editor’s self-censorship. And once the press begins censoring itself out of fear, citizens soon begin doing the same.
The matter is therefore bigger than The Observer. It is bigger than Ssemujju Nganda. It is bigger than General Muhoozi.
It concerns the constitutional space in which all of us live. General Muhoozi may disagree with The Observer. He may regard its journalism as biased. He may believe that some of its writers are unfair to him.
He is entitled to say so. But I would respectfully urge him to leave the newspaper alone to do what newspapers do.
If it is wrong, challenge it. If it is unlawful, use the law. If its arguments are bad, defeat them. But please do not make the newspaper wonder what “behaviour” you expect from it.
A constitutional democracy should not require the press to behave itself for fear of the powerful. It should require the press to comply with the law and uphold professional standards—and require those who wield power to restrain themselves because the Constitution does.
That is not hostility to General Muhoozi. It is advice in his own constitutional interest—and in ours.
The writer is a senior advocate and former Minister.
Thank you for the article. I agree with its contents/views.
Freedom of press was the first amendment to the U.S.
constitution that had been overlooked by the framers. Those who seek absolute and unchecked power attempt to undermine a free press. It is unbelievably happening in the U.S. However, courts and the media fraternity are pushing back. When CNN and others were banned, gov’t-friendly/Republican media outlets like Fox News stood with CNN and others not to cover WH events. Courts also made rulings that CNN and others cannot be banned from covering WH. We expect the same to happen in Uganda. Or is it expecting too much? I expect the New Vision, the Monitor, the Independent, UBC etc to stand with the Observer.
Let me test you bwana Kiyingi with criticism. Your articles are awfully long because you repeat so much! Some readers don’t have all the time to read long repetitive articles. If you get mad at me, then Muhoozi is vindicated, lol.
Point noted and appreciated. Will do better next time.
Joseph, Uganda is not the good USA. Stop the shallow comparison.
But with all the due respect Hon Asuman Kiyingi, since when are wrongdoers and/or criminals like General Muhoozi is respectfully urged to stop their self-incrimination through the Mass Media?
In other words, because of his newfound self-important and bravado; through the media, Gen MK has unfortunately, undeniably and more than enough incriminated himself for the rest of his life!
General Agony grew up as a spoiled military brat, with no good manners. Just like his old senile man he will always say whatever nonsense pleases him. He boy can’t hold his liquor.
Let’s put our comments/opinions/suggestions to those in power respectfully and without insulting. Bwana Kiyingi puts his views in a civil way. I do that too. You never know who your hateful words can radicalize.
I pray no one goes through what we had to deal with in our subregion in the mid 80’s to early 90’s. Some of us are living with life-long trauma. We were completely innocent but violence and suffering were visited on us. It all began when a few hated those in power and spread their hate. The hate got weaponized and we became innocent victims, yet people in power were not even from our subregion.
I was a “fresher”/freshman at the university the year after NRA captured power. Hatred and name calling against people from the greater north was distasteful. Actually, some wanted to make it look like South-North conflict. We should give Museveni and his group credit. If they had bought into that idea, we from the greater north would have been wiped out. It could have become a genocide. In fact, there were murders of people from greater north and UPCs in areas that NRA couldn’t reach immediately to pacify. Many from the south, especially one region that I won’t name now, were calling for retribution.
The best we can do to posterity is to stop hateful rhetoric and spread love instead. The cycle of hate and violence should stop.
Hon Asuman, your pleas might have had an effect IF the person you were pleading with was reasonable. With a hothead like Muhoozi, you are wasting your time.