Uganda (Human Rights)

Fiona Bruce Excerpts

Tuesday 24th April 2012 Westminster Hall

[Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)]

I am grateful for the opportunity to speak on this issue, which is of great importance to many people both inside and outside my constituency. It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Gray, and I thank hon. Members who have taken the time to participate in the debate.

Let me set the scene. Picture with me a quiet village on the Ugandan plains at night. There are lots of shacks, and the peaceful silence is interrupted only by the odd bleating of an animal. The children are asleep; all is at rest. The silence is suddenly destroyed by the noise of trucks, shouts and guns being fired. Families are literally dragged out of their homes. Children watch as their fathers are shot and their mothers are taken.

A little boy is pulled from his brother to stand in front of a man who points a gun at his head and tells him to shoot his mother. If he does not shoot her, he and his brother will be shot. He looks into his mother’s eyes as she slowly nods her head urging him to do it. He pulls the trigger, turns to his captor who says, “You are on my side now. You are my comrade in arms. You are a soldier in the Lord’s Resistance Army.” All that little boy knows is that he has killed his own mother. All that he believes is that he is evil and worthless, and all that he hopes for is that he never comes back to this place. Some people say that such events happen only in the movies and that it is not real life, but the fact is it is real life for far too many in Uganda.

[Fiona Bruce (Congleton) (Con)]

I congratulate the hon. Gentleman on securing this debate. It is not only real life for children now, but it has been real life for people in Uganda for 25 years. Some 1.5 million have been forced to flee their homes, 20,000 children have been abducted to become soldiers or sold as sex slaves. They are used as cart horses, force-marched and kept hungry for days. Other children are used as target practice. Babies are slaughtered for cannibalism and villages are abandoned. Again, I congratulate the hon. Gentleman on raising this matter and hope that in this debate we can highlight the atrocities right across this country and beyond because action must be taken to stop this.

[Jim Shannon]

I thank the hon. Lady for her words. She is well known in this House for her compassion and interest in many countries across the world where abuse takes place on a regular basis. In my comments, I will probably touch on some of her points.

In some areas, what I have outlined is still life and something must be done to change it. Some 20,000 children from Uganda have been kidnapped by the LRA for use as child soldiers and slaves. That is 20,000 childhoods stolen, 20,000 hearts broken, 20,000 children ripped from their mother’s arms and forced, as in my example, into terrible situations, and 20,000 reasons for us, as Members of Parliament, to stand here today and ensure that everything possible is done to make a difference to those lives.

The Lord’s Resistance Army, or the Lord’s Resistance Movement, is a so-called militant Christian group. There is certainly nothing Christian about its activities. It operates in northern Uganda, South Sudan, the Democratic Republic of the Congo and the Central African Republic and is accused of widespread human rights violations, including murder, abduction, mutilation, sexual slavery and forcing children to participate in hostilities—all grievous charges. Initially, the LRA was an out-growth and a continuation of a larger armed resistance movement waged by some of the Acholi people against the central Ugandan Government whom they felt marginalised them at the expense of southern Ugandan ethnic groups. The group is led by Joseph Kony, who proclaims himself to be the spokesperson of God and a spirit medium.

Since 1987, Kony is believed to have recruited between 60,000 and 100,000 child soldiers and displaced about 2 million people throughout central Africa. The LRA is one of the foreign organisations that the United States Government has designated as terrorist, and its leadership is wanted by the International Criminal Court for war crimes and crimes against humanity.

On 23 March, the African Union announced its intentions to send 5,000 soldiers to join the hunt for the rebel leader, Joseph Kony, and to neutralise him—its words—while isolating the scattered LRA groups, which are responsible for 2,600 civilian killings since 2008. This international task force was to include soldiers from Uganda, South Sudan, the Central African Republic and Democratic Republic of the Congo. Those are countries in which Kony’s reign of terror has been felt over a great many years.

Before that announcement, the hunt for Kony was primarily carried out by troops from Uganda. The soldiers began their search in South Sudan on 24 March, and that search will last until Kony is caught. Over the weekend, hundreds of people turned out for a rally in Northern Ireland to highlight the atrocities in Uganda and to call for tough action, ever mindful of the fact that the African Union’s 5,000-strong army has pledged to catch him.

The Americans have laid their cards on the table and are supportive of this hunt. In his response, will the Minister tell us how we are supporting the capture of this evil man and his army? There is also the issue of his dynasty. This is a man who is rumoured to have 88 wives and 46 children—he has been a busy man—and his ideals are certain to be carried on. We must do all that we can to ensure that there is no succession in this case.

The ravages of war have left the country literally dying and in great need of help. The conflict in the north of the country between the Ugandan People’s Defence Force and the LRA has decimated the economy, retarded the development of affected areas and led to hundreds of thousands of gross human rights violations. Those violations have centred on the poor emergency provision for internally displaced persons fleeing their homes to avoid the LRA. It has been estimated that 2 million Ugandans had to flee their homes. Many ended up in refugee camps, rife with disease and starvation—almost a case of out of the frying pan and into the fire. Disease has spread further through Uganda due to the number of people who are passing through these camps. Many are suffering in rural areas. A simple shot or course of antibiotics could almost instantly end the pain and stop the spread of disease. Will the Minister tell us what medical help has been given directly to Uganda?

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[Geoffrey Clifton-Brown (The Cotswolds) (Con)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, particularly as you are my parliamentary neighbour, Mr Gray. I congratulate the hon. Member for Strangford (Jim Shannon) on securing the debate and on the sincere way in which he put his case. He is gaining a great reputation in the House for the way that he handles things. He is entirely right to raise the issue of the Lord’s Resistance Army. My understanding is that, through military activity, the LRA has largely been driven out of north-east Uganda, which is more peaceful today than it has been for many years.

As the hon. Gentleman said, Mr Kony, the leader of the LRA, is indicted for war crimes and is still perpetrating atrocities in the countries in which he operates—South Sudan, the Democratic Republic of the Congo and the Central African Republic. The United Nations has operations in those countries, particularly in the DRC, but it does not have the resources to go after Mr Kony properly, and he is committing some of the worst human rights atrocities in the world. I hope that the UK will devote more attention to the matter.

[Fiona Bruce]

Would it be right to say that we should not only devote more attention to the matter, but work in partnership with other nations who want to see it resolved? That is how we can be most effective.

[Geoffrey Clifton-Brown]

Absolutely. My hon. Friend is entirely right. We do not have the resources to send troops in directly, but through the UN, we can help to bolster operations, perhaps in the DRC, so that we can put greater efforts into trying to capture a man who is, I repeat, an indicted war criminal. He is highly mobile and never sleeps in the same place, so capturing him requires considerable resources, particularly helicopters, so that our troops can keep ahead of the game and catch up with him.

As the hon. Member for Strangford said, in recent weeks and months, we have seen a rapid descent and some of the most appalling abuses of human rights under the regime of the Ugandan President, Yoweri Museveni. The police and security forces now regularly use lethal force, especially during political demonstrations, and I should like to address the crackdown on opponents of the Museveni Government. Ever since his so-called re-election in May 2011, there has been a wave of opposition demonstrations, many of which have ended up in violence. Opposition politicians, their supporters and journalists all too often face harassment, beatings and arrest.

The leader of Uganda’s main opposition party, the Forum for Democratic Change, Dr Kizza Besigye—a reasonable man whom I have met on a number of occasions—was recently attacked at an FDC rally, where police and military personnel surrounded him and cut him off from his supporters. They crushed his car screen and prevented him from leaving the scene.

Ever since the advent of the first multi-party elections in 2006, the Museveni Government have done whatever they can to prevent any opposition from playing on a level playing field. Before those elections, Dr Besigye was arrested on trumped up charges of treason and rape in an effort to prevent him from standing. On the occasions that I have met him, he has had to get special permission to leave the country, because he is still subject to those trumped up charges.

In another, more recent, incident, which I discussed with the Minister for Africa, the Under-Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs, my hon. Friend the Member for North West Norfolk (Mr Bellingham), Dr Besigye was leading a small demonstration by Activists for Change—the so-called A4C—outside a Government building, when a rock thrown from within that building hit a plain-clothes policeman, who subsequently, and unfortunately, died. The Minister for Africa told me these facts, so I know them to be correct. It seems reasonably clear that this was nothing whatsoever to do with Dr Besigye or any of his followers, yet scores of people were arrested, along with Dr Besigye, who was subsequently charged with unlawful assembly and placed under house arrest for a time.

The Ugandan Government declared on 4 April 2012 that A4C was an “unlawful society”, ahead of a planned demonstration on 5 April. The Ugandan Attorney-General, Peter Nyombi, also declared that, should members of A4C attempt to form a new group, that would also be banned—something that transpired after the members of A4C formed the new group called “For God and My Country”. The same Attorney-General said:

“If the old pressure group members are the same office bearers, the group remains illegal.”

Police and security forces continue to harass and disturb events and rallies organised by opposition supporters. At a recent meeting of the International Democrat Union’s Africa branch in Kampala, delegates—international delegates coming into Uganda—were harassed by the police force, which forced the Fairway hotel to cancel the IDU’s booking and attempted to force the Grand Imperial hotel to deny the IDU space.

Last week, several people, including a 12-year-old girl, were injured and shops closed in a one-hour battle between police and supporters of Dr Besigye, as the police attempted to stop him from accessing the Nakasero market simply to have his lunch.

Only yesterday, several women were arrested as they protested at the brutal manner in which the opposition FDC Women’s League leader, Ingrid Turinawe, was arrested last Friday. My hon. Friend the Member for Stourbridge (Margot James) has already mentioned that incident, but it bears repetition. Ms Turinawe was assaulted on Friday as the police blocked a rally called by the opposition in Nansana, outside Kampala. Ugandan television footage clearly shows that, as several officers tried to pull her out of her vehicle, she was sexually assaulted and she is heard shouting out in pain. This is all part of a downward trend in the ability of political opposition in Uganda to fulfil its basic rights and to protest peacefully.

Worryingly, a proposed Public Order Management Bill, which is before the Ugandan Parliament, could further limit freedom of expression for demonstrators, if passed in its current form. Under the Bill, public meetings will be prohibited in certain circumstances. It will prohibit public meetings that are aimed at discussing Government policies and affairs of management. For journalists, the Bill will limit their role of seeking, receiving and imparting information, which is a vital aspect of freedom of expression and democracy. Journalists, along with political demonstrators, are also increasingly coming under attack by police and security forces.

The Human Rights Network for Journalists-Uganda documented 107 cases of attacks on journalists in 2011, compared to 58 in 2010 and 38 in 2009. That demonstrates a worrying trend.

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[Mr Browne]

I certainly will. I confess that I do not speak from first-hand experience on these matters. I am not the Minister for Africa—he is in Africa, which is why I am replying to this debate—but I want to ensure that the Foreign Office’s understanding of the situation is entirely in accord with the reality, as perceived by my hon. Friend the Member for The Cotswolds (Geoffrey Clifton-Brown). We will take his advice seriously and I will ensure that it is understood and scrutinised properly by the African department of the Foreign and Commonwealth Office.

[Fiona Bruce]

This is particularly important. As I understand it, DFID has committed £100 million to post-conflict development in northern Uganda over the current five-year period. Building legitimacy, improving the capacity of local government to deliver services, supporting government, civil society and communities to engage peacefully and reconciliation are all important post-conflict work but, as we have heard today, conflict is still happening. There is still abuse and oppression, and I ask the Minister to discuss with his counterpart for Africa the £100 million dedicated to post-conflict work while so much trouble is still occurring.

[Mr Browne]

We do not always get a clean break between conflict and the absence of conflict. The assessment of DFID and the Foreign Office is that progress is sufficient for us to make a difference with the types of programmes described by my hon. Friend. I understand her concerns, and in the time available I will address some of that issue and others, if I may continue my speech.

Laws against and repression of homosexuals were rightly mentioned at length by the hon. Members for Bristol East and for Airdrie and Shotts (Pamela Nash) and others. For the avoidance of doubt, I will spell out the British Government’s clear position. The United Kingdom is strongly committed to upholding the rights and freedoms of people of all sexual orientations. The Prime Minister made the United Kingdom’s opposition to the criminalisation of homosexuality clear at the Commonwealth Heads of Government meeting in October 2011. In Kampala, the United Kingdom continues to lobby strongly against the proposals in the Bill and is working closely with civil society groups campaigning against them. The Minister for Africa expressed our concerns to the President when they met in February, and the Minister for Equalities, who arrives in Kampala this evening, will underscore the United Kingdom’s opposition to the proposals when she meets the Ugandan Government. We are doing all that we can to give formal force to the views that were rightly strongly expressed by Members during the debate.

On the nature of the assistance that we provide to Uganda, to return to the previous intervention, UK aid is aimed at reducing poverty and at helping the most vulnerable people. Often those at greatest risk of human rights abuses in developing countries need our help the most. We do not attach conditionality to our aid for that very reason. We do, however, hold full and frank discussions with recipient countries about issues of concern, including human rights, as we have done with the Ugandan Government on the importance that we attach to equality and non-discrimination. We hold those Governments that receive aid through direct budgetary support to account, to ensure that that represents the best way of getting results and value for money for the United Kingdom taxpayer. If we cannot give aid directly to Governments, because we are not sufficiently confident about how that aid is being spent, we find other routes to help people whom we assess need our assistance because of the straitened circumstances in which they live.