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Well connected: The resistance against the fossil industry in East Africa.

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Activist in Uganda protesting for environmental justice.

Uganda and Tanzania have created facts about the promotion of the fossil industry by launch on the construction of the East African crude oil pipeline. At the same time, the internationally networked resistance of civilian actors towards the booming oil production in East Africa is growing. Judicial complaints are a central element in their fight to uphold the rule of law, human rights and environmental protection.

Last year, the beginning of the end of the fossil era was ushered in at the world climate conference in Dubai. Some countries interpret this as follows: it is necessary to get the last fossil fuels out of the ground. This means drilling, dredging, pumping – to earn crude oil, gas and coal once again.

One example is the fossil industry in Uganda, which is trying to feed its last fossil occurrences from the ground into the global economy. It wants to pump the petroleum down there to the surface and through a heated pipeline into a deep-sea port into the Tanzanian tanga. From there, it, together with the French energy giant TotalEnergies and Chinese participation, is being shipped for the global oil industry.

The oil project called the East African Crude Oil Pipeline (EACOP) with a targeted running time of 25 years has been under construction since this April. In Tanzania and Uganda, the scope of civilian actors who are fighting against land seizures for the 1,443-kilometre-long pipeline corridor and defending human rights is severely restricted. In Uganda, the police have arrested farmers, journalists, human rights and environmental defenders who have spoken out against the oil projects. Reporters Without Borders once again stated in May that freedom of the press and civil say are strictly curtailed. At the end of May, eight environmental activists were arrested when a letter of protest to the Chinese Embassy was arrested by Ugandan security forces. Obviously, governments sacrifice freedom of expression, human rights and livelihoods for their fossil utopianism.

Bizarre oil shops

Uganda’s government is not only pursuing an export strategy for its crude oil, which is stored in the Albertgraben on the border with the DR Congo. It also wants to modify its own oil import infrastructure. For this purpose, Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni initiated an old oil dispute with Kenya: In February, the neighbouring countries decided to resume the plan to expand the Mombasa-Eldoret-Kampala pipeline. This pipeline originates in the port of Mombasa/Kenya, on the Indian Ocean and currently leads via Nairobi to Eldoret in West Kenya. This part has been in operation since May 2014. For many years, plans to extend the pipeline have been circulating, first to Kampala on Lake Victoria, Ugandan, then on to Rwanda’s capital Kigali, possibly even to Lake Bujumbura Burundi around Lake Tanganyika.

This would mean that on the one hand, the export of crude oil is being produced, while at the same time the import of refined oil will be extended. This contradicts any economic logic that the finishing of a product is not outsourced as far as possible. While Uganda wants to transport its crude oil via the East African crude pipeleline EACOP to the port to Tanga and sell it from there on the world market, from Mombasa, 130 kilometres north of Tanga, refined oil via the Mombasa Eldoret pipeline to Kampala is to be pumped at the same time.

On the one hand, crude oil transport for the world market, on the other hand, import of refined oil – that is, of fishing-for fuels – for one’s own energy needs: this is an old pattern for asymmetric trade relations – or, as the Kenyan climate activist Omar Elawi said: business colonialism. Others will benefit from the refinement of the crude oil and transport. The oil, transported twice over thousands of kilometres, puts a heavy impact on the environment and undermines the social development of the adjacent municipalities. The economic dependence of the Global South is simply reproduced in terms of trade policy. And climate policy, the EACOP is also a disaster that undermines the fair energy transition in Uganda.

Problems and protest on the spot …

It is therefore not surprising that the sharpest critics of EACOP include many regional environmental and human rights defenders as well as initiatives affected. For example, Witness Radio Uganda documents land veins on an interactive map and has been providing legal assistance to people in rural areas affected by land expulsion for years. Tonny Katende from Witness Radio says: “We combine legal assistance and media work to mobilize the rural population. This is the only way she can protest with a strong voice against the injustices in land use and environmental destruction and advocate for equal access to resources in our country.”

Another activist is Christopher Opio, founder of the Oil Refinery Residents Association (ORRA). The NGO with over 7,000 members recently protested before the Court in Hoima in Western Uganda. This is where the pipeline is to start, and 42 households have recently been sued by the government, because they refused to accept compensation for their country: “This means that these people are now being driven out of their country,” said Opio. At the protest on the 15th April the landowners moved through the city towards court. They hold signs high with messages such as “Do not attach our rights” and “do not self-elige us for oil”.

TotalEnergies has been drilling in Tilenga on the northern shore of Lake Albert on Lake Albert since June 2023. Four hundred holes are planned, one third of which are in a natural park. In the Kingfisher area further south of the lake, the Chinese company CNCOOC is taking hold to light since January 2023. Fishing communities of both places turn to the companies with a protest letter in April 2024: the light from the drilling rigs violates and distributes the fish, and nitrogen- and phosphorous-containing wastewater is burdening the water quality. The risks documented by international environmental organizations such as Les Amis de la Terre, Natural Justice and Greenpeace, as well as Human Rights Watch and BankTrack, are concerned about water and the health of over eleven million residents at Lake Albert: 426 wells ensure that water is pumped from Lake Lake Lake. The water is then heavily heavy metal and poses a threat to the population as wastewater. A leak would be a disaster for which no one is sufficiently prepared.

… and anti-imperial rhetoric of the revolt

Local civilian actors in Tanzania and Uganda, including lawyers, students and stakeholders, are often discredited by their own governments as an extended arm of imperial Western environmental extremists. An environmental journalist and a community worker temporarily left the country for persecution and intimidation.

Governments sacrifice the environment for their fossil utopianism

Activism does not arise from a capitalist lobby, but scientifically proven risks to the environment, dangers to the health of neighbouring communities, concrete human rights violations such as land displacements and expropriations, and de facto violent attacks by the police and the military – including rape and massive bodily injury to the rural population. On the basis of research and witness reports, problems are combated, such as the inadequate compensation of the oil lobby or the authoritarian behavior of the project operators. Here the anti-imperial rhetoric of the government side is like a diversionary manoeuvre.

The Chinese CNCOOC and TotalEnergies are now feeling resistance from all over the world in addition to the local protest. This is the international (instead of imperial) dimension of the debate. More than 260 civil society organisations are demanding a stop from EACOP. The political forms of action and protest of the well-connected movement against the construction of the EACOP are manifold: an important lever is legal complaints against violations by companies and governments. Another strategy is divestment. Potential investors or insurance companies should be persuaded not to invest in environmentally harmful and anti-social projects, or to deduct their capital from such projects.

Complained, divestment and political pressure

In November 2020, four East African civil society organisations, including AFIEGO, Natural Justice Kenya and the Tanzanian Strategic Litigation Centre (SLC), filed a complaint against EACOP at the East African Court (EACJ). After an initial dismissal, the Appeals Division of the East African Court requested the plaintiffs at the beginning of the year, until 22. March submit written comments. By the end of April, the defendants were again allowed to react to them in writing. The civilian plaintiffs see legal principles violated by the state, including the environmental and human rights standards enshrined in the Treaty of East African Community for the benefit of current and future generations, as well as compliance with international treaties.

The consortium of lawsuits is an expression of a regionally and internationally well-connected NGO community, which takes legal action against the fossil fuels, including its financial and reinsurance companies, through legal action. This means that among the global civilian NGO networks is growing know-how to strategies for how to take several tracks against the land grabbing of the climate-damaging fossil industry. With the worldwide campaign “StopEACOP, 29 investors have now been discouraged to be part of the pipeline project, including the second largest German insurance group Talanx.

In the fight against the large-scale fossil-fuel project EACOP, the strategy of divestment is considered promising, especially in Europe: Public pressure on the suppliers from the construction, insurance, logistics and credit institutions sectors is to prevent the cash flow for the project, which is still not financially secured. Another great success of the international campaign alliance “StopEACOP” was the withdrawal of the Japanese Sumitomo Mitsui Financial Group over a year ago. Meanwhile, 27 banks and 23 reinsurers as well as four export credit agencies have announced that they will not support EACOP. Therefore the mood on the Instagram account of the campaign alliance is sometimes euphoric.

The political pressure was also some success. International alliances confront politicians with studies such as “A Disaster in the Making” by Les Amis de la Terre or “Our Trust is Broken” by Human Rights Watch 2023. The European Parliament called on the governments of Uganda and Tanzania to comply with human rights standards in September 2022. In a decision on the COP27 climate conference, the German Bundestag spoke out against the financing of the EACOP in 2022.

Do the climate complain?

Lucien Limacher from the organisation Natural Justice from South Africa, one of the members of the plaintiffs against the EACOP before the East African Court, generally likes the effects of climate lawsuits. On the one hand, climate lawsuits are also increasing on the African continent. However, Limacher also says: “In the global North there is a misunderstanding about how we define climate processes. Africa will suffer massively from the consequences when global warming of more than 2.5 degrees is suffering.” In addition, in view of the 400 to 600 fossil projects that are up to 400 to 600, the climate cannot be saved solely through the route of the process. “So we need to think about how we proceed in legal disputes. A new way of thinking is emerging on the African continent: local climate lawsuits are no longer just about emissions, but about much more comprehensive risk factors such as access to food and water or land, because these areas that will be most severely affected.”

Despite the manifold resistance, the further construction of the EACOP is also progressing – and thus Uganda’s desire to become part of the ranks of the petrostate, half of which cover their economy from oil business. After the exit of European and Japanese banks from EACOP financing, the French energy giant TotalEnergies has signed a contract with China Petroleum Pipeline Engineering (CPP) for the construction and supply of line pipes. This means that the cross-border project has been relocated to Beijing, from where most of the still missing loans are likely to come from. During the recent visit of China’s head of state Xi Jinping to France in early May, there was no public talk of the oil shipping in Uganda. It is hardly conceivable that Macron and Xi of all people can silence the issue, because the resistance against the EACOP is great, especially in France.

The struggles for oil production in Uganda, with the words of the Ugandan anthropologist Paddy Kinyeras 1, show that pipelines as critical infrastructures represent physical manifestations of power geometry. The realization of the pipeline requires governmental power and strengthens it at the same time. Since the Paris Climate Agreement, the World Climate Summits have been a place to publicly confront this government and corporate power and to create political back pressure against the fossil industry. They also serve as an international networking area for the civilian actors.

At the end of 2024, after the United Arab Emirates in 2023, a fossil heavyweight will once again host the World Climate Summit: Azerbaijan. And thus for the third time in a row a country that plans to rely on fossil resources and revive oil and gas production before the agreed phasing-out. Once again, the summit will be headed by a long-standing employee of an oil company, Muchtar Babaiev. He is the Minister for the Environment of a host country that has little understanding for civilian engagement. It is not very promising to take place against the charged fossil lobby. This is one reason upon all, internationally networked environmental, research and human rights initiatives in the fossil industry. They are essential to open the oil business with protests, climate lawsuits, divestment campaigns and political pressure.

Source: www.iz3w.org

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The East Africa regional court dismisses a case challenging the construction of the EACOP project. East African Court of Justice is to decide whether it has jurisdiction to try the EACOP case filed by Four East African NGOs today. A reference filed by CSOs against the planned construction of the East African Crude Oil Pipeline (EACOP) is set for hearing. The East African Court of Justice fixes the ruling date for a petition challenging the EACOP project. Appellate Division of the East African Court of Justice (EACJ) to hear an Appeal filed by CSOs which seeks to reinstate a petition against the construction of the EACOP project tomorrow.

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Govt targets land grabbers with first national public-land register

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August 14, 2026

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Officials say a nationwide inventory will finally let the state prove what it owns — from school compounds to road reserves — but the exercise is beginning on a shoestring.

Mukono, Uganda — Uganda has begun building its first comprehensive national register of government land, an undertaking officials say is aimed squarely at land grabbers who for years have carved up public property the state often cannot prove it owns.

The five-year exercise, the Comprehensive Government Land Inventory, will document every identifiable state plot — schools, hospitals, police stations, road reserves, wetlands and forests among them — and record who owns each, how it is used and whether it is under threat.

“If we don’t do that, then we may never have land to protect,” Lands Minister Judith Nabakooba told a regional workshop at Rider Hotel in Mukono, east of the capital Kampala, on Thursday.

The vulnerability is considerable. Government land makes up about 23 percent of Uganda’s territory, but only roughly a quarter of it has been formally titled, according to the Uganda Land Commission — leaving the majority undocumented and, officials concede, easy to grab.

Nabakooba said Uganda’s rapid transformation was making the problem worse. Towns are spreading, infrastructure and industry are expanding, and land that was rural only a few years ago is now valuable real estate. She warned that population growth — which she said could push Uganda towards 70 million people by 2050 — would only sharpen the competition for a fixed supply of land.

The minister urged local authorities to enforce physical development plans and to build upwards rather than outwards. “Can we now begin thinking of going vertical when you are building offices and spaces for accommodation… then the rest of the land is used for agricultural purposes?” she asked. She singled out Wakiso district, on Kampala’s fringes, where development pressure is most intense, and cautioned officials against surrendering government plots simply because they appeared vacant.

Local knowledge, national record

The Mukono meeting, billed as the “Buganda 1” engagement and the second after the programme’s national launch in July, gathered district chairpersons, resident district commissioners, land board members and civil society from central-region districts including Wakiso, Mukono, Buikwe, Kayunga, Luweero, Nakasongola and Buvuma.

Uganda Land Commission chairperson Prof Pen Mogi Nyeko told them their local knowledge was central to the exercise. “You all virtually know what land belongs to government,” he said, appealing to them to help identify and title state plots — and warning land boards not to hand public land to individuals.

He said the state was the country’s biggest developer, and that consolidated, protected land could anchor major projects. Nyeko pointed to the Amuru sugar scheme in northern Uganda, where the government compensated landowners across some 10,000 hectares for a plantation and factory, as an example of what public land could enable, describing the local opposition it once faced as “negative politics”. The project in fact has a long and contested history, resisted for years by Acholi communities and their leaders and fought through the courts over customary ownership before compensation was settled.

Nyeko also raised the grabbing of institutional land, including plots belonging to church-founded schools. “Many of you were students in these lands, in these schools. So it is you to help us get those lands protected,” he said. He stressed the commission was not after private property: “The constitution is very clear: land belongs to the people. For us, we are only interested in land which belongs to government.” A reliable inventory, he added, would let the state direct investors to suitable sites — “if we know that there is 2, 3 square miles of land belonging to government in Nakasongola… we recommend that area for industrialisation.”

A reform on a tight budget

For all its ambition, the programme is starting with little money. The commission has said it was costed at about 100 billion shillings (roughly $27m), but only 6 billion shillings was released this financial year, even after a parliamentary committee recommended more. Implementation will be phased, beginning with cities and municipalities where land values — and the incentive to grab — are highest.

Emmanuel Kaganzi, representing the ministry’s permanent secretary, said the register had to capture more than ownership. It should show whether each parcel was surveyed, titled and free of encroachment or competing claims, he said, giving government the chance “to intervene early” rather than react to disputes after the fact.

But a register was only as good as its upkeep, he cautioned. “A government land inventory completed today but not updated tomorrow will gradually lose its usefulness.” He said responsibility for keeping records current would fall across the commission, the ministry, local governments and the agencies that occupy state land, and pressed repeatedly for coordination between them. The inventory, he added, should build on systems already in place — the Uganda Land Information System, the National Land Information Centre and the ministry’s zonal offices, which have moved land services closer to citizens — rather than create new silos.

Kaganzi was blunt about the human element. “An accurate system will achieve little if public officers knowingly allow government land to be encroached, to be taken, to be grabbed, and irregularly allocated,” he said, adding that officials entrusted with public land must treat it as belonging to the people of Uganda.

Cross-checking a fragmented record

The commission’s secretary, Andrew Nyumba, said the state’s own records were part of the problem, scattered across the commission, ministries, local governments and district land boards and never fully reconciled. The existing records, he said, did not amount to a comprehensive picture of government land.

For each holding, he said, the inventory should answer a set of basic questions — what the parcel is, where it lies, its size and boundaries, the evidence of state ownership, which institution is responsible, how it is used, whether it is documented and whether it is occupied, encroached upon or disputed. The commission would draw on registry and cadastral data, ministry and local-government records, survey and planning information, asset registers, historical archives, community knowledge and, where needed, physical checks on the ground.

Those sources would be cross-checked against one another, and disagreements, Nyumba argued, were useful rather than a setback. “A discrepancy in information is not necessarily a failure of the exercise. It is also information,” he said, describing conflicting records as a signal of where further verification was required. The goal, he said, was to move “from fragmented information toward a more reliable, integrated and continuously maintained picture of government land in Uganda”.

The drive follows years of criticism over the commission’s record-keeping. The Auditor General has previously flagged the absence of a comprehensive government land database, and the body has been drawn into numerous court cases over contested public plots — the very gaps the inventory is meant to close.

Source: www.ugstandard.com/

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Why govt is launching a comprehensive digital land registry Government urges Ugandans to register their land interests to reduce land evictions. Govt moves to register surveyors to curb land conflicts Land commission starts updating govt land countrywide. Kasese district land bosses ordered to cancel land titles of gov’t land grabbers
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Experts rally the region to unite behind East Africa’s transformative Agroecology Bill.

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4 days ago

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August 12, 2026

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By the Witness Radio team.

Across East Africa, experts and agricultural advocates are urging a united front for the proposed East African Community (EAC) Agroecology Bill, believing its passage could revolutionize food systems, empower food sovereignty, and uplift millions of farmers’ lives.

In mid-April 2026, the East African Legislative Assembly (EALA) officially began the legislative process for the EAC Agroecology Bill, 2026, after the Agriculture, Tourism and Natural Resources Committee chairperson, Hon. Gideon Gaptan Thoar, received parliamentary leave to draft and introduce it. The drafting committee is now in the final stages of tabling the bill before parliament.

This rallying cry echoed through an online webinar hosted by the Center for Food and Adequate Living Rights and broadcast live on Witness Radio. The event gathered agricultural experts, food sovereignty champions, and regional legislators to explore the bill’s promise and the hurdles it may face.

If passed, it would lay the foundation for a unified regional legal framework championing agroecological farming throughout the East African Community. Supporters believe this could be a powerful tool to combat food insecurity, protect farmers’ rights and indigenous seeds, address climate change and biodiversity loss, and tackle challenges faced by smallholder farmers.

Mr. Andrew Adem, Program Coordinator for Food Systems at the Alliance for Food Sovereignty in Africa (AFSA), said the region must learn from the shortcomings of the Green Revolution model, which prioritized increased yields and external agricultural inputs.

He pointed out that although the model aimed to boost yields and farmers’ incomes, it left them vulnerable when harvests fell short.

Adem noted that in tough seasons, farmers often bear the high costs of expensive inputs, while intensive farming erodes agricultural diversity and time-honored knowledge.

To address these challenges, he said, agroecology flips the script by putting farmers and their wisdom at the heart of agricultural progress.

“In Africa, food is more important than yields because it carries a lot of things. Therefore, the Green Revolution failed, and hence the Agroecology Bill presents an opportunity for us to stand up and protect the sovereignty of food in Africa,” Adem said during the Webinar meeting.

He explained that agroecology inspires farmers to break free from expensive external inputs, nurture healthier soils, diversify their crops, and tap into the wealth of local knowledge and resources.

Unlike systems fixated on monocultures and quotas, advocates say agroecology embraces nutrition, culture, biodiversity, and the enduring wellbeing of farming communities.

This legislative push arrives as hunger casts a long shadow over Africa. Jean Leonard from the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) highlighted that the continent bears the World’s largest hungry population, with around 309 million people affected.

He described agroecology as a holistic approach, weaving together ecological and social principles to shape and guide agricultural systems.

“Agroecology seeks to optimize interaction between people, markets, agriculture and ecosystems while addressing environmental, social and economic systems simultaneously rather than focusing on single technologies,” Leonard said.

Leonard outlined key ingredients for the success of the Bill: dedicated lawmakers, appropriate budgets, robust funding, supportive laws, and genuine involvement from farmers. She urged greater investment in youth, believing that empowering young people with resources and opportunities could open fresh paths into agriculture and speed the shift to agroecological farming.

Hon. Jackline Amongin, a Ugandan member of the East African Legislative Assembly (EALA), said the proposed legislation is intended to create a common framework for agroecological farming across the EAC.

She emphasized that the East African Community’s unique character calls for unity, not fragmented efforts, in transforming agriculture.

“We shall have the best, but all efforts must be put on enacting the Bill into law. Once the law is put in place, all the desired issues of implementation and execution will be agreed on. Other factors will follow,” she added.

Advocates stress that agroecology is more than a farming method. They see it as a philosophy that links agriculture to environmental care, social justice, cultural heritage, nutrition, and economic vitality.

This approach inspires farmers to exchange wisdom, broaden their crops, and craft solutions tailored to their unique landscapes.

According to the Bill memorandum, the purpose of the EAC Agroecology Bill, 2026, is to mainstream agroecological farming by promoting agroecology principles across agri-food systems. It seeks to integrate ecological, social and participatory approaches while combining scientific and traditional knowledge to enhance biodiversity, ecosystem services, resilience, livelihoods and food sovereignty.

“The Bill will therefore be tabled and gazetted before being subjected to public consultations, hearings and participation by members of the public. It will then proceed to a second reading before being referred to the whole House Committee for detailed consideration. Once all these processes are duly followed, the Bill will be presented for a third reading and passage by EALA. It will then go through the EAC process before ultimately becoming an Act.” She concluded.

Related posts:

East African lawmakers and CSO leaders are meeting in Uganda to draw up plans to promote Agroecology as an alternative to climate change mitigation. Agroecological farming: EAC Bill moves to Parliament to establish a regional legal framework to protect and promote sustainable farming and food systems. EALA members renew push for unified sub-regional Agroecology Law during Mukono meeting. The Indigenous Seeds movement in East Africa is convening in Kenya, with the potential to reshape the region’s food systems. The EAC Seed & Plant Varieties Bill, 2025, is a potential threat to smallholder farmers, as it aims to disengage them from the agriculture business, according to experts.
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Four youth activists now face public nuisance charges after their arrest during a bold march toward Parliament.

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August 11, 2026

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By the Witness Radio team.

At Buganda Road court, four youth activists from the Rooted in Resistance Movement were charged with public nuisance after their arrest during a passionate plea to Parliament for an oil-free Uganda.

Activists Ssembalirwa Aniwally, Mugoya Hassan, Aron Patrick Ariong, and Okanya Ivan were detained by parliamentary police as they marched with determination toward Parliament, urging the Ugandan government to abandon oil dependency in favor of an ‘oil-free economy’ built on economic freedom, sustainability, and citizen involvement.

According to the charge sheet seen by Witness Radio, the prosecution alleges that on August 10, 2026, at about 9:00 am, the four activists, along with others still at large, were at King George Way Street in Kampala Central. They wore orange T-shirts bearing the words “Rooted in Resistance” and carried placards with messages including “Prioritize Other Sectors of the Economy,” “Oil Is Temporary, Nature Is Permanent,” and “Oil Today, Problems Tomorrow.”

Prosecutors claim the activists stood on the road, disrupting traffic and creating hazards.

The activists appeared before Grade One Magistrate Her Worship Rophine Achayo at Buganda Road court yesterday, where they were charged with being a nuisance on the public road, contrary to Section 67(1) of the Road Act, Cap. 346.

Section 160(1) of the Penal Code Act, which defines a common nuisance, provides that any person who does an act not authorized by law or fails to discharge a legal duty and thereby causes “any common injury, or danger or annoyance,” or obstructs or causes inconvenience to the public in the exercise of common rights, commits the misdemeanor of common nuisance and is liable to imprisonment for one year.

The four pleaded not guilty and now await their fate in Luzira Prison, remanded until August 28, 2026.

The group’s mission was to urge Parliament to rethink Uganda’s reliance on petroleum, warning that true prosperity cannot be built on a resource that will one day run out.

The activists contend that despite years of promises—jobs, industry, infrastructure, and poverty relief—oil’s benefits have reached only a privileged few, while many others remain trapped in poverty.

“Our demand for an oil-free economy is not a rejection of development, but a demand for a different development model, one that places Ugandan citizens, productive sectors and sustainable wealth creation at the center of national planning,” the group said.

They call for bold investment in other sectors, insisting Uganda should chart a path toward sustainable wealth, citizen empowerment, and true economic independence instead of clinging to petroleum.

These arrests are part of a troubling pattern as more Ugandans face criminal charges for protesting oil projects or demanding accountability for their social and environmental costs.

12 environmental activists were arrested in Kampala in August 2025 during a protest against the East African Crude Oil Pipeline (EACOP). Eight out of the 12 activists were later convicted and sent to prison to serve an eleven (11) month sentence. They were released from Luzira Prison on April 21, 2026, as time spent on remand had effectively covered their 11-month sentences.

The other four, including Ivan Wamboga, Baker Tamale and Habibu Nalungu, pleaded guilty and were released on November 19, 2025, after being ordered to perform community service. Mark Makoba also pleaded guilty and was released on November 6, 2025, without any additional penalty.

These cases reveal the risks faced by those who challenge Uganda’s oil agenda. Even after release, the activists’ ordeals have intensified fears for freedom of expression and assembly across civil society.

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Youth activists detained as they boldly petition Parliament, demanding a future for Uganda free from oil dependency. Ugandan Activists Face Criminal Charges Following Pipeline Protest Breaking: 15 Anti-EACOP Activists have been charged with common nuisance and remanded to Luzira prison. Another group of eleven environmental activists have been charged with common nuisance and remanded to Luzira Prison for opposing the EACOP project. Youth climate activists raise frustration over govt’s silence on EACOP
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