CLA News / Rights of Peaceful Protest and Freedom of Expression Africa: When Speaking Becomes a Crime By Kizito Enock
Across Africa today, the rights to peaceful protest and freedom of expression supposedly guaranteed by constitutions, regional treaties, and human dignity itself are being suffocated by states that increasingly view dissent as a threat to national stability. These are not abstract rights; they are lived freedoms, the oxygen of civic life, and the basis upon which communities can demand justice, including climate justice, social justice, and political accountability. Yet in East Africa and much of the region, these rights are treated as dangerous privileges that can be withdrawn the moment citizens begin to speak too loudly or gather too boldly.
Among the East African countries Uganda, Kenya, Tanzania- Uganda provides one of the clearest examples of how a state can turn basic freedoms into criminal offences. The constitution promises freedom of expression and the right to assemble peacefully, but in reality these promises collapse under the weight of the Public Order Management Act, the Computer Misuse Act, sedition-style provisions of the Penal Code, and a policing culture that treats peaceful citizens as insurgents. People are routinely arrested for holding placards, sharing critical tweets, or even gathering in twos and threes to discuss governance. The charges brought against them would be hilarious if they were not deeply cruel: “offensive communication” for asking uncomfortable questions; “cyber harassment” for highlighting corruption; “common nuisance” for holding a banner; “incitement” for chanting slogans; and “unlawful assembly” for meeting without prior police approval. These laws operate like a trapdoor wide open whenever the state needs to catch someone whose only crime is refusing to be silent.
What makes East Africa’s situation particularly disturbing is that even where the law appears to guarantee safety such as the constitutional right to bail the practice tells a different story. Bail has become a gamble, not a right. Courts delay hearings, prosecutors conveniently “lose” files, sureties are rejected for unclear reasons, and police simply re-arrest suspects at the prison gate immediately after court grants release. Bail exists on paper, but in reality it depends entirely on the political mood of the state. Whether a person goes home or returns to a cold cell becomes a matter of luck, not legality. This weaponisation of bail is a form of silent punishment: while charges crumble in court, the state ensures the accused suffers before trial.
Uganda has a long and painful list of people who have been arrested, criminalised, or humiliated for speaking truth to power. Dr. Kizza Besigye, perhaps the most emblematic example, has been arrested so many times that even journalists have stopped counting. His so-called crimes walking to work, addressing supporters, criticising corruption would be absurd if they did not reveal a deeper truth about the state’s fear of accountability. Besigye has been charged with everything from “incitement” to “treason,” dragged through endless court processes not to secure justice but to break his resolve. Yet he remains a symbol of courage, a reminder that dissent is a moral obligation when injustice becomes normalised.
But Besigye is not alone. Uganda’s prisons and police cells have held countless ordinary citizens whose names rarely make headlines: students, journalists, boda boda riders, market women, young activists, opposition supporters, environmental defenders, and online truth-tellers who refuse to let corruption or abuse go unchallenged. Many remain detained without trial; others are repeatedly arrested and released in a cycle of intimidation. These are political prisoners in every meaningful sense of the term imprisoned not for crimes, but for courage.
The shrinking civic space in Uganda mirrors broader trends across East Africa. Kenya, long considered a relatively open civic environment, has recently witnessed a resurgence of state hostility toward activists and protesters. Boniface Mwangi, one of Kenya’s most prominent human rights defenders, has faced repeated arrests, harassment, and even suspected politically motivated attacks, including the burning of his home. His consistent challenge to corruption and injustice has made him a target, and yet he remains a powerful voice, refusing to retreat. In one notable moment of cross-border solidarity, he was arrested together with Ugandan activist and journalist Agatha Atuhaire, an incident that revealed how East African states increasingly collaborate in suppressing critical voices rather than protecting regional democratic norms. Their arrest symbolised a troubling truth: the repression of free expression in East Africa is coordinated, transnational, and growing.
Tanzania’s experience adds another dimension to the story. Under the late President John Magufuli, the civic space contracted sharply, media houses were shut down, activists were arrested, and critics were monitored. Although President Samia Suluhu Hassan has opened the space slightly, the legacy of fear persists. Tundu Lissu, one of Tanzania’s bravest opposition figures, survived an assassination attempt after years of state harassment. His arrests on “sedition” and “hate speech” charges, simply for criticising government actions, show how quickly political expression can be redefined as criminal behaviour. Lissu’s resilience is a testament to the strength of East African activism, but also a reminder of how dangerous dissent can be.
A thread weaves through all these country scenarios: the criminalisation of protest and the policing of speech are now central strategies of political control in East Africa. Governments justify repression using vague laws, claiming they are protecting “public order,” “national unity,” or “morality.” But public order is not preserved by silencing the public. National unity is not built by arresting those who cry out when injustice bites. And morality is not defended by punishing those who expose corruption.
Media freedom itself has become a battlefield. In Uganda, radio stations are shut down mid-broadcast when opposition figures speak. Journalists covering protests are beaten, arrested, or have their equipment confiscated. Investigative journalists face criminal charges designed to deter scrutiny. Kenya and Tanzania have seen periodic media shutdowns and laws introduced to control online spaces. Information about corruption, environmental degradation, land grabbing, or climate-related injustices is increasingly treated as contraband. When the press is silenced, the people become blind.
This has enormous implications for climate justice. Protest and expression are vital tools for communities resisting destructive extractive projects, exposing illegal land evictions, challenging harmful mining practices, and demanding accountability for climate financing. A community that cannot speak cannot defend its land. A journalist who cannot report cannot expose environmental theft. A young activist who fears arrest cannot mobilise for climate action. Silencing dissent directly harms the forests, rivers, wetlands, and ecosystems that sustain East African life.
Despite the repression, East Africans continue to speak. They march, write, live-stream, organise, document abuses, and stand in solidarity across borders. Their courage is not naïve; it is necessary. They understand that silence is more dangerous than intimidation, and that a society without dissent is a society sliding quietly toward authoritarianism.
The struggle for peaceful protest and freedom of expression is, at its core, a struggle for the soul of East Africa. It is about dignity. It is about truth. It is about the right of every citizen to say, “Things are not okay,” without handcuffs waiting at the door. It is about the belief that when the government fears its people, democracy breathes; but when people fear their government, democracy dies.
In this moment of shrinking civic space, one truth remains clear: those who speak up for justice are not criminals. They are the backbone of freedom. And if speaking the truth has become a crime, then perhaps the region needs more criminals of conscience, more voices willing to risk everything so that future generations may breathe freer air.
Author: Kizito Enock
Ugandan Human Rights Advocate
