{"id":21297,"date":"2026-01-13T18:30:09","date_gmt":"2026-01-13T18:30:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/africa\/21297\/"},"modified":"2026-01-13T18:30:09","modified_gmt":"2026-01-13T18:30:09","slug":"uganda-crackdown-internet-blackout-ahead-of-vote","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/africa\/21297\/","title":{"rendered":"Uganda: Crackdown, internet blackout ahead of vote"},"content":{"rendered":"

Uganda’s government has continued its harsh crackdown on dissent in the country ahead of a Thursday election<\/a> that the United Nations Human Rights Office says is taking place in an atmosphere of repression and intimidation.<\/p>\n

Recently, the Ugandan government ordered local rights groups to halt work investigating election integrity. Now, it has initiated a total internet blackout.<\/p>\n

The blackout was confirmed by web tracker NetBlocks.<\/p>\n

In a post on X, NetBlocks said, “Live network data show a nation-scale disruption to internet connectivity in Uganda.”<\/p>\n

Journalists in the capital Kampala say they lost internet access after the Uganda Communications Commission ordered internet providers cut access to prevent the spread of “misinformation” and electoral fraud.<\/p>\n

Some international phone calls were also being blocked said the journalists.<\/p>\n

UN has been condemning pre-election abuses in Uganda for months<\/p>\n

A November UN report claimed that Ugandan authorities began detaining \u2060hundreds of opposition supporters well \u200dahead of a January 15 election in which President Yoweri Museveni looks to extend his four-decade rule over the country.<\/p>\n

Museveni came \u2060to power in 1986 after leading a five-year rebellion. He is currently Africa’s third-longest ruling head of state.<\/p>\n

Museveni has changed \u200cthe constitution twice to remove age and term limits<\/a> and his control of institutions leaves no room for an election upset in the East African country of 46 million.<\/p>\n

\"Opposition<\/p>\n

Opposition politician Bobi Wine has described the campaign as ‘war’ and is rarely seen in public wiothout a bulletproof vestAbubaker Lubowa\/REUTERS<\/p>\n

The two watchdogs told to stop \u200dtheir work this week had denounced rights \u200bviolations \u200bincluding the arbitrary detention and torture of opposition supporters and journalists.<\/p>\n

The UN said Friday that police and military had used live ammunition to \u200ddisperse peaceful rallies, made random arrests and renditioned opposition supporters ahead of the vote.<\/p>\n

The government has defended security forces actions as a justified response to the lawless conduct of opposition supporters.<\/p>\n

The main opposition candidate<\/a> Bobi Wine, whose real name is Robert Kyagulanyi, is rarely seen in public without his flak jacket<\/a> and has described the campaign as a “war.”<\/p>\n

Wine has been arrested multiple times in the past and tortured in military custody.<\/p>\n

Edited by: Louis Oelofse<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Uganda’s government has continued its harsh crackdown on dissent in the country ahead of a Thursday election that…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":21298,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[58],"tags":[5896,13241,13244,13243,153,13242,2564],"class_list":{"0":"post-21297","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-uganda","8":"tag-internet-blackout","9":"tag-internet-connectivity","10":"tag-internet-providers","11":"tag-opposition-supporters","12":"tag-uganda","13":"tag-united-nations-human-rights","14":"tag-yoweri-museveni"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21297","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=21297"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21297\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/21298"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=21297"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=21297"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=21297"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}