Yearbook 2012
Uganda. In February, two ministers accused of corruption resigned. They claimed that the business they had with an entrepreneur in the capital Kampala had been approved by President Yoweri Museveni, which he denied.
The MP who had proposed the death penalty for homosexual acts submitted a revised proposal, where the most severe sentence was now life imprisonment. But the proposal was still a tightening of existing law, which prohibits homosexuality. Lifetime imprisonment would apply to anyone caught for the second time with homosexual acts. The proposal was approved by the government. Police later arrested a British theater producer who put up a play about a gay man. One human rights organization wanted the Constitutional Court to consider whether the bill was constitutional.
In April, the opposition group Action4Change was banned by the regime. The group was still trying to carry out protests, but its leading female politician Ingrid Turinawe was arrested and exposed to sexual harassment during the arrest. The TV pictures from the incident upset many, and a police officer made an apology.
- AbbreviationFinder.org: Provides most commonly used acronyms and abbreviations for Uganda. Also includes location map, major cities, and country overview.
The campaign film “Kony2012” about the war crime accused Ugandan warlord Joseph Kony had about 100 million views on YouTube during the year. The film depicted Kony’s rebel group The Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA), which has committed bestial massacres and kidnapped children as sex slaves and soldiers. Kony and his rebels were now believed to be staying in the Central African Republic, and critics of the film said it was silent about allegations against the Ugandan regime’s army of similar abuses. Uganda led an African military force that, with the support of the US Army, chased Kony and his people. During the year, one of the LRA’s leaders, Caesar Achellam, was arrested.
In June, a severe landslide occurred after heavy rains in eastern Uganda, where eleven villages were buried. Data on the number of victims went apart, but over a hundred people were reported to have been killed. The government declared that it would relocate the population of the area as hundreds of people were killed in landslides on Mount Elgon’s steep slopes in recent years.
During a regime-critical protest in October in Kampala, the police used tear gas against the protesters and seized the country’s leading opposition politician, Kizza Besigye.
Sweden stopped its assistance to Uganda in October, after the Ugandan National Audit Office discovered that funds for schools, clinics and roads in poor northern Uganda had been dissipated. Officials in Uganda’s Riksbank, the Ministry of Finance and the Prime Minister’s Office were arrested on suspicion of the fraud. Sweden demanded back SEK 45 million of aid paid since 2009. Uganda was affected by the fighting in the mineral-rich eastern Congo (Kinshasa) between the rebel group Movement on March 23 (M23) and the Congolese army. Hundreds of thousands of people were displaced, and many of them traveled across the border to Uganda.
Uganda was commissioned to mediate between the M23 and the Congo (Kinshasa) government. The mission was filled with conflict when a UN report leaked in October accused Uganda (and Rwanda) of supporting the M23. The reaction was upset by Uganda, which threatened to bring back its large Somalia peacekeepers unless the charges were withdrawn.
However, Uganda’s mediation continued under President Museveni’s leadership in Kampala, where the leader of eleven countries in the region and the M23 pilgrimage in November.
The World Nature Fund stated in November that the number of mountain gorillas in the world has increased. The largest increase was in the fog-covered mountains of the Bwindi National Park in Uganda, from 340 animals in 2006 to at least 400 in 2010. This means that almost half of the world’s mountain gorillas live in Bwindi. Investments in more park guards, increased patrolling and poaching contributed to the increase, according to experts. Every year, park guards find thousands of snares laid to catch gorillas.
Population 2012
According to countryaah, the population of Uganda in 2012 was 38,225,342, ranking number 35 in the world. The population growth rate was 3.340% yearly, and the population density was 191.3090 people per km2.
