National Human Rights action plan to be unveiled

Jul 23, 2015

FOLLOWING a series of consultative meetings with various stakeholders; government is set to unveil a five year national action plan on human rights in October this year

By Clare Muhindo

 

FOLLOWING a series of consultative meetings with various stakeholders; government is set to unveil a five year national action plan on human rights in October this year.

 

The plan is intended to spell out roles, functions and obligations of each stakeholder in a manner that their respective contributions to the protection, promotion and enjoyment of fundamental and other human rights and freedoms will be complementary and mutually reinforcing. 

 

Like other national government planning processes, the National Action Plan (NAP) will strengthen the promotion, protection and respect of human rights in Uganda at both public and private levels.

 

Gordon Mwesigye the Secretary to the Human Rights Commission, while opening the consultative meeting with the business community, on Thursday at City Royal Hotel in Kampala, said the NAP is a key policy document that will guide the government in fulfilling its human rights obligations, through setting clear goals.

 

“It describes strategies to be used in achieving set targets by clearly stipulating time bound pointers,” he said.

 

During this meeting, members of the business community and other activities identified key issues that the plan should not leave out.

 

Roselyn Karugonjo, the head of consultancy to develop the NAP said it has focused on vulnerable and marginalised groups such as people with disabilities, the media, women, prisoners, people who live around industries, among others.

 

“It would prevent adverse human rights violations. For instance the conditions of prisons are still deplorable with lack of access to medical care. Also prisoners are overworked and subjected to other forms of ill treatment,” she said.

 

Karugonjo said the plan recognizes that no country has a perfect human rights record and that is why Uganda has started from its own actual political, cultural, historical and legal circumstances.

 

The plan is in fulfillment of a pledge made after its first human rights assessment at the United Nations Human Rights Council’s Universal Periodic Review (UPR) in Geneva in 2011.

 

During the review, the government accepted 110 recommendations, including protection of people with disabilities, promoting the right to education, protection of wetlands, early childhood development, and rights of elderly persons, among others.

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