STATELESSNESS AND CITIZENSHIP IN THE EAST AFRICAN COMMUNITY Somalis from Somaliland and Somalia Somalis are not among the communities listed as indigenous to Uganda. However, there is a significant Somali population in the country; many of them refugees but also descendants of pre-independence migrants dating back several generations, among them those whose origins can be traced to Somaliland rather than Somalia. Pre-independence Isaq Somali migrants from Somaliland were British protected persons, and thus eligible either for automatic attribution of citizenship or for registration as citizens according to the transitional provisions on citizenship at independence. Subject to evidence of membership of this community, numbering perhaps one or two thousand people, the Isaq Somalis are recognised as Ugandan by the authorities.293 Nonetheless, the community of Somaliland origin has faced difficulties in the past obtaining Ugandan passports. During the mass registration process for the new national identity card, it was necessary for Somalis to prove that they fulfilled the requirements for automatic attribution of citizenship at independence—that is, that, if not themselves alive in 1962, one parent and one of his or her own parents were born in Uganda; or they were able to apply for registration or naturalisation as citizens. Some who were genuinely entitled to Ugandan citizenship based on the principles for automatic attribution at independence were turned down, and not necessarily informed of the right to register or naturalise on the basis of twenty years’ residence in the country.294 The distinction is critical, because those who acquire citizenship by registration or naturalisation cannot transmit citizenship to their children, whereas those who are descended from people who automatically acquired citizenship at independence are treated as citizens by birth. The population of Somali ethnicity in Uganda has been swelled in recent years by migrants from Kenya, for example following the 1989 screening process that withdraw identity documents from some Kenyan Somalis.295 There are also some 307,000 registered Somali refugees, arriving since the collapse of the Somali state in the early 1990s.296 Long-term refugees: Rwandans, Congolese, Sudanese Like the other countries of the EAC, Uganda has an honourable history of welcome towards those fleeing war or persecution, and Uganda has not enforced requirements for refugees to be confined to camps, permitting those not resident in camps to work and move freely about the country. As of mid-2016, more than 500,000 refugees were resident in Uganda, with new outflows from South Sudan still increasing that number; by March 2018 the number had increased to 1.4 million.297 Among these, some long-term refugees have been present in the country for more than fifty years, including Rwandan Tutsi who fled to Uganda in various episodes from 1959 to 1973 and Congolese who fled after the 1964 defeat of the Lumumbist rebels.298 Around 60,000 have been present in the country at least 20 years, the baseline for naturalisation, including Sudanese refugees from before the 2005 Comprehensive Peace Agreement that led to the secession of South Sudan, and both Rwandan and Congolese refugees from the mid-1990s fleeing the genocide in Rwanda and the regional conflicts that followed.299 Justice and Constitutional Affairs to the Director of the National Identity and Registration Authority, Kampala; interviews, August 2016; presentation of John Agison Amugune to International Refugee Rights Initiative workshop, Kampala, 2 May 2018. 293 Interview, Department of Immigration, Kampala, 9 August 2016. 294 Interview, representative of Somaliland community, Kampala, 8 August 2016. 295 Gianluca Iazzolino, A Safe haven for Somalis In Uganda? Rift Valley Institute Briefing Paper, August 2014. 296 UNHCR, Uganda Fact Sheet, March 2018. 297 UNHCR, Uganda Fact Sheet, March 2018. 298 Charles Celestin Bafaki Rweyunga, “Local Integration as a Durable Solution for Protracted Refugees in Uganda: A Case Study of the Lumumbist Congolese Refugees at Kyaka 2 Refugee Settlement”, Makerere University LLM Dissertation, 2014. 299 70 Interview, Office of the Prime Minister, 3 August 2016. UNHCR / September 2018