Between safety and illegality: a statutory–constitutional–jurisprudential synthesis of the Building Control Act (2013, as Amended 2026) in Uganda

Abstract

The Building Control Act (2013, as amended 2026) of Uganda represents one of the most significant — and contentious — intersections between regulatory governance, constitutional rights, and developmental realism in the country's legal order. Establishing a mandatory permit regime administered through Building Control Committees, the Act imposes technical requirements that the overwhelming majority of Uganda's urban population cannot satisfy. The 2026 amendments escalated its penal architecture to include per-square-metre fines, custodial sentences of up to two years, and mandatory demolition at owner's cost. This article subjects the Act to a tripartite analysis — statutory, constitutional, and jurisprudential — drawing on the Physical Planning Act, the Public Health Act, and Articles 8A, 21, 28, 42, 44, and 92 of theConstitution of Uganda. Through the application of seminal Ugandan judicial decisions — Attorney General v Salvatori Abuki, Attorney General v Susan Kigula, CEHURDv Attorney General, and the KCCA demolition jurisprudence — the article advances the thesis that while the Act remains formally valid within Uganda's positivist legal order, its constitutional tenability is severely strained and its jurisprudential legitimacy structurally undermined. The article introduces the concept of the 'mass illegality paradox' as the operative mechanism through which a formally valid law collapses in practice, and proposes a reform framework grounded in regularisation, tiered compliance, and the substantive justice mandate of Article 126(2)(e).