Parliament has granted leave to Charles Onen, the Gulu East Member of Parliament, to present a private member’s bill to enact a law on the National Transitional Justice System, which seeks to provide a platform for reconciliation and accountability when national conflicts occur.
Speaking on Thursday, August 28, 2024, at the regional Parliamentary sitting in Gulu City, Onen said the bill is aimed to address all facets of transitional justice, ensuring accountability, truth-telling, reparations, and reconciliation.
Onen defended the enactment of the law, arguing that since the 1962 independence, Uganda has experienced cycles of violence, political instability, and gross human rights violations, especially during the brutal regimes of Idi Amin and Milton Obote and during the protracted LRA insurgency in Northern Uganda, among other conflicts, which have left the nation with deep scars that need healing.
“The different episodes of political instability have left deep scars and trauma on the nation. And most of those who lost their lives actually have never been heard, and justice has never been given to them,” Onen stated.
He added that whereas the government has made tremendous efforts towards resolution of conflicts and maintenance of peace and security within the country, there is still a need to address the historical wrongs through measures that will embrace accountability, truth, reconciliation, and reparation, as well as institutional and legal reform.
The deputy Attorney General, Jackson Kafuuzi, asked parliament to give him three months to bring this bill forward as the cabinet was in the final stages of drafting its principles, but his request was rejected.
