Loud, clear calls to ditch Protection of Sovereignty Bill from senior lawyers, Uganda Law Society, and rights groups

Uganda’s sovereignty lies with its people, and despite the naming of a new bill approved by Cabinet and tabled before Parliament last week, the Protection of Sovereignty Bill, 2026 (Bill) undermines such sovereignty rather than upholding it, says the Uganda Law Society and many senior lawyers, rights groups, and others. 

The controversial Bill was presented for first reading last Wednesday, 15 April, by the State Minister for Internal Affairs, General David Muhoozi, and has been referred to the Committees on Defence & Internal Affairs and Legal & Parliamentary Affairs for detailed scrutiny. The Bill seeks to regulate how individuals, businesses, and organisations receive money or assistance from foreign sources, and to curb foreign-funded activities deemed a threat to the country’s sovereignty.

However, a growing chorus of voices from across Uganda are speaking out against the Bill, warning that it would limit freedoms, disrupt daily life and cut off vital support from Ugandans living abroad, while also breaching Uganda’s Constitution. 

The Bill’s stated concern of addressing foreign interference in government policy, foreign aid that carries influence, and the use of online platforms to spread misinformation, is a concern worth addressing, says leading Ugandan lawyer Kenneth Muhangi of KTA Advocates, but the Bill goes well beyond such concern.

“The Bill defines ‘foreigner’ to include Ugandan citizens residing outside Uganda, and then adds a further category of any person, institution or body whom the Minister may declare to be a foreigner by statutory instrument,” notes Muhangi. 

“That is not regulation,” he adds. “It is re-description. It takes belonging, which the Constitution has already settled, and places it within reach of ordinary legislation and ministerial discretion… Sovereignty located in the people, as Article 1 [of the Constitution] requires, means preserving the conditions under which people can work, transact, invest and organize. A Bill that burdens those conditions beyond what is constitutionally necessary does not protect sovereignty. It narrows it.”

The Bill would reportedly require anyone receiving money from the Ugandan diaspora to obtain authorisation from the Interior Ministry, with penalties of up to 10 years in prison for non-compliance, and up to 20 years for offenses like ‘economic sabotage’. It also caps foreign-linked funds and could affect up to a million Ugandans abroad, potentially even questioning their citizenship status. Civil society groups have decried the Bill as a ‘liberty-restricting’ law, warning it undermines constitutional rights and could severely impact families dependent on remittances.

Tonight at 7 PM EAT, Muhangi will debate the new Bill on a special edition of Judicial Service Conversations (JSC Conversations) on X Space, hosted by lawyer Elison Karuhanga, and also featuring Enoch Barata, the Senior Partner at Birungyi, Barata & Associates, who unlike many other lawyers and the Ugandan Law Society, argues the Bill is essential to protect Uganda’s national interests in a changing global order.

Yesterday, Asiimwe Anthony, the Vice President of the Uganda Law Society, eviscerated Barata’s support for the Bill, noting Barata was not speaking as an independent lawyer but the Director of Legal Services of the National Resistance Movement (NRM), the ruling party in Uganda since 1986. The same party that was now trying to curb the constitutional rights of Ugandans and stifle dissent. 

“The NRM Legal Director’s defence of the so-called National Sovereignty Bill (in reality the Anti-Sovereignty Bill) presents a familiar script: ‘the world is changing, foreign interference is real, Uganda must adapt’. But beneath the polished references to acronyms such as FARA, FICA and the global trends he cites lies a simple constitutional truth [he] conveniently ignores. Sovereignty in Uganda belongs to the people, not the Government… This Bill does not protect that sovereignty. It transfers it to the Executive by allowing the Minister and a proposed Department of Peace and Security to define “Government interests” and punish dissent.” 

Anthony notes the Bill is effectively null and void under the Constitution, given it makes fundamental changes without a national referendum, and also that it separately collapses under international human rights standards as vague and overbroad laws granting unchecked executive discretion. “The African Commission on Human and Peoples’ Rights sets similar standards: restrictions must be necessary, proportionate and non-discriminatory. Blanket criminalisation fails this test.”

Rights groups and others had expressed serious concerns about the Bill even before it was tabled before Parliament, and criticism of the Bill has amplified in recent days, with women leaders, civil society groups, and community representatives saying the Bill, if passed, would do more harm than good. The Uganda Law Society (ULS) has also spoken out strongly, beyond Anthony’s rebuttal of Barata’s support for the Bill. 

“We are renamining this Bill what it really is, the Anti-Sovereignty Bill,” said the ULS in an official statement yesterday. “It does not protect Uganda’s sovereignty. It destroys the sovereignty - the people’s right to self-determination - that belongs to Ugandans under Article 1 of the Constitution and hands all power to the Executive instead.” 

Beyond being unconstitutional in process, the Bill is designed to crush free speech and turn ordinary criticism of Government policy into ‘economic sabotage’, and turn Ugandans living abroad into ‘foreigners’, notes the ULS. The Bill would cut off funding to independent schools, hospitals, media and NGOs. “Its rules are so vague and overbroad that the Government can jail almost anyone it dislikes. This is exactly the kind of law that our own courts have consistently thrown out as unconstitutional.”

In terms of the international community, the ULS noted that if the Bill passes as written, Uganda will have ‘walked out of the family of democracies’. The ULS said it stands with the Ugandan people to restore and enforce the Constitution.