The Independent Uganda: You get the Truth we Pay the Price
Why the treatment of Muganga’s citizenship question is suspect and echoes deep-seated anti-Banyarwanda prejudice
COMMENT | NNANDA KIZITO SSERUWAGI | For all its legalistic shadings, the recent citizenship controversy faced by Dr Lawrence Muganga, the vice chancellor of Victoria University, who was appointed State Minister for Internal Affairs by President Museveni in the new cabinet, is suspicious. It contradicts the very reason I believe Muganga was appointed to such a key ministerial position – to deal with the issue of prejudice against the Banyarwanda community in Uganda, especially pertaining to their citizenship. It seems to me that Immigration misled the parliament by presenting him as having multiple citizenships, yet that matter had been settled by granting him dual citizenship on account of being a former Ugandan admitting his dual citizenship and by implication confirming that he is a citizen by birth. This effectively extinguished the material value of claiming he had multiple citizenships. For this, I believe immigration was biased against Muganga, or maybe they were genuinely mistaken, because by their own public account, they granted him dual citizenship in 2024, having satisfied the verification process. The State, by its own considered act, through a body charged to apply the law to the letter in coming to that decision, is tied by the common-law doctrine of legitimate expectation not to casually and adversely block Muganga’s ministerial appointment without credible evidence supporting the allegations conflating his citizenship status. If the 2024 verification process was legitimate, it is the report contradicting it now that deserves interrogation.
It is paradoxical that he directly suffered the ills his appointment was meant to solve at the Ministry of Internal Affairs, where Ugandans of Banyarwanda descent have for years been discriminated against and denied passports. I will endeavour to avoid disregarding the legal questions claimed to be the reasons behind Muganga’s dilemma and instead deal with them on their merit, if anything, to reveal that they do not hold but instead expose what they really are – an empty shell concealing deep-seated anti-Banyarwanda bias.
By attempting to put Muganga on trial for covering up his so-called multiple nationality, government institutions have instead put themselves in the dock. Muganga’s case has prominently given them a mirror to stare at their biases in the application of the citizenship law.
The Ugandan public, especially on social media, has also fallen gullible to many assumptions made about Uganda’s citizenship laws. Contrary to what has been carried in much of the public debate online, Ugandan law does not forbid holding more than one citizenship. The old law forbidding dual citizenship was abrogated by the Constitution (Amendment) Act of 2005. The new law expressly permits dual citizenship. To administer these changes, Parliament went ahead to pass the Uganda Citizenship and Immigration Control (Amendment) Act of 2009. Therefore, on the face of it, a Ugandan may legally hold the citizenship of another country.
The narrow restrictions of the law on dual citizenship under Section 23 of the Uganda Citizenship and Immigration Control Act must be diligently comprehended. These restrictions cover specific high-level state offices, among which are ministerial posts. The reasons behind this are obvious. Due to the sensitivity of certain government positions to the security and sovereignty of our country, it is prudent that safeguards are taken to ensure that Ugandans are the ones holding these positions to avoid prejudicing our political stability. A foreign agent could cunningly acquire Ugandan citizenship, use it to hold a key public office, and jeopardise our security. Nobody would reasonably deny such a point. It is even more crucial that such a law must be stringently applied to the Ministry of Internal Affairs, given its centrality in overseeing the nervous system of national security in such areas as immigration, passport issuing and citizenship verification.
One cannot renounce a status they have never acquired. Muganga’s Rwanda connection is work-related, not a citizenship by naturalisation. The fact that the foreign document considered to make him a Rwandan citizen, had even expired makes the claim even more absurd.
If we are honest about the status quo at Uganda’s Ministry of Internal Affairs, the people deserving enhanced state protection, the people who have been wronged, whose security has been breached, sometimes rendering them stateless, and therefore critically affected by the leadership responsible for passport issuing and citizenship verification, are the Banyarwanda. Muganga belongs to this community. Given this peculiarity, a blanket prohibition of his holding a key ministerial post under the pretext that he holds “multiple” citizenships is absurd, however much it is ironically framed as though government institutions are protecting our national security. The truth is that they are perpetuating the denial of national protection to a large community of citizens.
Much of the dispute around Muganga’s citizenship collapses the moment we settle the decisive question: Is he a Ugandan by birth? According to Article 10 of the Constitution, citizenship by birth is entrenched. It can neither be taken away nor renewed. It is an inherent right of persons having an ancestral connection to Uganda. Without a formal and deliberate renunciation by the holder in a prescribed manner, citizenship by birth forever obtains. The constitution of Uganda does not provide for anyone extinguishing another’s birthright simply because they acquired a document, a residence permit, or even a passport of another country. That is the essence of citizenship by birth being inherent.
Across the border in Kenya, the question of inalienability of citizenship by birth has been settled by the court in the case of Miguna Miguna and is glaringly persuasive for us to borrow without reinvention. Born in Kenya, Miguna similarly acquired Canadian citizenship just like Muganga. The Kenyan government deported him in 2018, claiming that he had forfeited his Kenyan nationality by acquiring dual citizenship. Miguna ran to court. It was settled that obtaining citizenship of another country does not strip a person of their citizenship by birth.
The hottest potato in Muganga’s controversy is perhaps to do with his links to Rwanda, having once worked in that country. The misapplied knowledge in this confusion is the fact that a passport is not prima facie evidence of sworn allegiance and naturalisation as far as citizenship is concerned. Passports can simply be issued for evidence that the holder is entitled to the protection of the issuing state. That does not conclusively imply proof of nationality.
It is common knowledge that countries issue passports for several reasons under disparate circumstances. A passport is a travel and identity document which does not necessarily confer citizenship. This is why Muganga’s alleged holding of a Rwandan passport when he went to work as an auditor there in 2003 should not ipso facto be equated to having “multiple” citizenships.
Uganda is one of the countries that supported the liberation struggle against apartheid by issuing travel documents and protection to exiled anti-apartheid fighters from Southern Africa. This enabled them to move and work, and eventually defeat apartheid. Reasoning backwards, one could mistakenly assume that documents that allowed Southern African nationalists to settle and work in foreign countries meant they became nationals of their hosts. Therefore, the parliament erred in purporting to compel Dr Muganga to renounce a Rwandan citizenship he had never applied for in the first place. One cannot renounce a status they have never acquired. Muganga’s Rwanda connection is work-related, not a citizenship by naturalisation. The fact that the foreign document considered to make him a Rwandan citizen, had even expired makes the claim even more absurd.
This makes his prejudicial treatment a sign of misinterpretation of the law, an incident of institutional incompetence, or simply an act of bad faith. A parliamentary appointments committee cannot give a verdict to settle this important legal question. The president did the right thing to ask all four ministers-designate, including Adonia Ayebare (Foreign Affairs), Shartsi Kutesa Musherure (Microfinance), Lawrence Muganga (Internal Affairs) and David Calvin Echodu (International Affairs), who had unresolved citizenship queries, to first consult with the Solicitor General. Hopefully, all the ministers will officially renounce and relinquish their foreign nationalities and retain their ministerial posts. Muganga must not suffer an injustice similar to the plight of thousands of Banyarwanda Ugandans whose citizenship has often, illegally and summarily been denied by the Directorate of Citizenship and Immigration Control (DCIC).
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The writer is a Ugandan thinking about Uganda.
