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DEFENDING LAND AND ENVIRONMENTAL RIGHTS

Why UN Food systems summit is irrelevant to Uganda’s smallholder farmers: A case of capitalism pushing the poor away from family land

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Some of the community members affected by land grabbing in Kiryandongo District

By witnessradio.org team.

As the United Nations, is striving to end hunger, achieve food security through sustainable agriculture what they termed as one of the 17 sustainable development goals by 2030, Uganda still grapples with mass forced evictions being aided by International development financiers being hosted and protected by big nations.

In Uganda, the ‘development financing’ has exacerbated poverty, hunger among the local populations, threatened food security, and forced inhabitants to migrate to urbanized cities or working as laborers on large plantation farms established formerly on their land as the only means of looking for survival.

Ever since the mandate to set up the Food Systems Summit was taken over from the Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) by the UN secretary-general’s office in close partnership with the World Economic Forum, a private sector organization fronting corporate interests, the summit lost its relevance as far as smallholder farmers concept in Uganda is concerned.

The governance of the summit is under capture by “experts” known to be staunch defenders of industrial agriculture, and wealthy nations, which host many of the large multinational corporations and International Development Financiers, to drive their agenda.

In a bid to translate these aspirations into tangible results, the United Nations’ three-day pre-summit in Rome, which ended on the 28th day of July 2021…. in a lead up to the UN Food Systems Summit in September in New York City, US, made no mention of peasant agroecology, or indigenous ecological knowledge and it’s feared by smallholder farmers to be fronting corporates’ interests.

In a survey conducted by Witness Radio-Uganda on development projects (agribusiness, afforestation, carbon offset projects, mining, and infrastructure development) being financed by members of the World Economic Forum for the last ten years, both COVID-19 lock-downs inclusive, estimate that 1, 257,200 (one million two hundred, fifty-seven thousand and two hundred peasant families have been forcefully evicted or threatened with eviction from more than 5 million Ha.

Approximately 98.2% of the grabbed land or on the verge of being grabbed was agricultural land being used for subsistence farming by local peasants.

As we write this story, Nalumunye Betty, not real name, a small-holder farmer in Kawaala who grows yams to feed her family fears that an eviction facilitated by World-Bank financing of the expansion and construction of Lubigi Channel under the Kampala Institutional and Infrastructure Development Project (KIIDP-2) Project will take away her cheap and sustainable source of food.

She is not alone, there are many other smallholder farmers across the country including Kiryandongo district, 122 Km away from Kampala facing a related quandary. They are battling multi-national companies, including, Agilis Partners Ltd through its Asili Farms that received USD 1,200,000 from the Netherlands-based Common Fund for Commodities (CFC), a basket fund that gets part of its money from the European Union. Agilis Partners Limited is using the development finances to forcefully evict thousands of peasants off their land.

“Every eviction has a ripple effect and this country will have to pay dearly for it soon”, Mrs. Joan Bulyelari, one of the legal officers with Witness Radio – Uganda, noted with great concern.

“It is a double-edged sword. It takes away a live hood and leaves communities hungry. It breeds domestic violence, breaks families, forces children out of school. Just look at what is happening in Kiryandongo. Employees of multi-national companies are raping mothers and defiling children to defeat their spirited efforts to reclaim their land from multi-nationals”, she added.

By and large, agriculture plays a vital role in the Ugandan economy, and most of the persons evicted are smallholder farmers whose land is being targeted constitute 68% (sixty-eight percent) of all working Ugandans are employed by agriculture.

Small-holder farmers account for 89% (eighty-nine percent) of all land users in Uganda. They contribute up to 80% (eighty percent) of the annual total agricultural output, this includes food crops.

Conversely, this contribution seems to have been overlooked by key stakeholders’ aggressive advocacy, and blind funding by international financial institutions of large-scale mechanized agriculture without prioritizing the land rights of smallholder farmers, which is an affront to food security that has been guaranteed by small-holder farmers through their 80% (eighty-percent) contribution to the annual total agriculture.

According to the Country Director, Witness Radio-Uganda, Mr. Wokulira Geoffrey Ssebaggala, “It is time we rethink, and jealously protect the smallholder farmers’ contribution to food sovereignty, but that debate will only make sense if key stakeholders; governments, financial institutions, and international bodies take up the responsibility to finance community-led projects that cater for the protection  of land rights of smallholder farmers.”

“They should not just throw money at large-scale agricultural and development projects, especially, if they will involve the forceful land acquisition. These development finances are aiding instability in Uganda and worsening food insecurity yet it should alleviate such issues. This is akin to throwing pearls to pigs. International financiers, among other solutions, should set independent supervisory and audit units to ensure that there is prior, adequate, fair, and prompt compensation before any evictions ”, he advised.

In Rome, the priorities of the UN Food Systems were emphasized on paper as “hunger and nutrition, climate change and inclusion and equity but such can only be achieved if the summit remains an independent space for all to find lasting solutions to food security.

Earlier this month, one of Uganda’s dailies, The Daily Monitor, reported that a total of 36 civil society organizations (CSOs) in Uganda and across Africa under the Alliance for Food Sovereignty in Africa (AFSA) had ruled out their participation in the United Nations Food Systems Summit (UNFSS) scheduled for September 2021 in New York, USA.

UNFSS is accused of excluding the critical views of indigenous farmers in defining suitable food systems, “We are deeply concerned that the current rushed, corporate-controlled, unaccountable, and opaque process for this summit will not lead to the transformation we envision of sustainable and healthy food systems.”, its statement read in part.

Globally, the International Peasants Movement, while christening the UNFSS as a ‘Scientific Group’ also views it as a composition of “corporate-sponsored actors who legitimize corporate-owned knowledge and technology systems, and hold peasant agroecological practices in contempt.”

Witness Radio Uganda will not take part in the Food Systems Summit, later in September 2021 in New York, instead joins other actors to reaffirm the need of the UN and other stakeholders to rethink approaches that have left smallholder farmers landless and threatening food security.

 

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DEFENDING LAND AND ENVIRONMENTAL RIGHTS

Mityana district police rounded up and arbitrarily arrested over 50 Kikuube PAPs to block them from meeting Uganda’s Prime Minister.

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By Witness Radio team

Two (2) community land rights defenders and 68 projects-affected persons from Kikuube district including children have been rounded up and arrested by Mityana district Police, Witness Radio has learned.

The community group led by Fred Mbambali and Ahumuza Busingye, were arrested from City Healing Church in Mityana Municipality, Mityana district. They were arrested on the orders of Mityana District Police Commander, Mr. Hasunira Ahmed, without being informed of the reasons for the arrest.

To seek justice and reclaim their grabbed land, the community decided to journey from the Kikuube district on Saturday, 2nd March 2024. Their objective was to petition Uganda’s Prime Minister, Rt. Hon. Robinah Nabanja, to intervene in grievances concerning forced evictions from their land and their unsuccessful attempts to regain ownership of their land that was grabbed by the officials of the Prime minister’s office for Kyangwali resettlement camp.

“On Friday, we departed from Kikuube district to Kakumiro intending to meet the Prime Minister. We aimed to convey the challenges we are facing following the unlawful seizure of our land. We sought her intervention to help us regain ownership, especially since many offices that were approached have not helped end our misery. Unfortunately, upon our arrival, we discovered she was in preparations to leave her residence. Instead, she instructed her private security team to escort us to her party’s offices (National Resistance Movement, NRM) in the Kakumiro district, assuring us that she would meet with us there. But she did not come back.” Mr. Mbambali Fred, one of the group leaders told Witness Radio.

Little did the affected community members know that their stay at the offices would be short-lived. Initially, they were welcomed by the security officers at the party offices, but their situation took a turn when the District security committee of Kakumiro led by the Resident District Commissioner (RDC), Mr. Matovu David and the District Police Commander (DPC) in the area Mr. Niyonzima Morris visited and questioned them about the reasons for their visit.

Subsequently, PAPs explained that they had been directed to wait at the offices by the Prime Minister. Despite their explanation, the Committee was skeptical and held an emergency meeting to resolve that Kikuube PAPs should leave the premises. The committee stated that the issue raised was not within the mandate of the Kakumiro district and thereafter, were asked to relocate to a different location, not within Kakumiro.

The stern Kakumiro district leaders directed the group to depart and proceed to the Office of the Prime Minister in Kampala for their meeting with her.

Shortly after being chased, they proceeded to Kampala via Mityana road, but PAPs sought to rest at one of the churches in the Mityana district. As soon as they occupied the church, Mityana district raided the premises, arrested all of them, and took them to Mityana Central Police Station, claiming that PAPs were posing a threat to the community.

“We were rounded up and arrested without being given any opportunity to explain ourselves. They didn’t even inform us of the reason for our arrest. We were kept at the police for nearly 12 hours without food. Both children and elders were starving, and the children even reached the point of crying because we were not allowed to move. It’s a double punishment to us because we haven’t committed any offense,” Ahumuza Busingye, another defender, told Witness Radio.

They were cautioned and later released without charges.

The Mityana District Police Commander, Mr. Hasunira Ahmed confirmed the arrest, stating that people neighboring the church had lodged complaints with the police about unknown individuals with a large amount of luggage occupying their premises. This led the police to arrest them.

“We received complaints about these individuals occupying a particular church, which posed a potential threat because they hadn’t obtained permission to stay there and didn’t possess a letter authorizing their movement to their destination. That’s why we intervened with an arrest, as many of them looked like rebels,” stated the Mityana District Police Commander.

PAPs arrested are part of the larger group of over 90,000 people evicted between 2013 and 2019 in 29 villagers by the office of the Prime minister (OPM) to give their land to the refugees in Katikala and Bukinda in Kyangwali district.

The community was evicted by officials led by Charles Bafaki from the Office of the Prime Minister, accompanied by the police and Uganda People Defence Forces (UPDF), from their land measuring 36 square kilometers located in various villages, including Bukinda A and B, Bukinda 2, Kavule, Bwizibwera A and B, Kyeya A and B, Nyaruhanga, Kabirizi, Nyamigisa A and B, and Katoma, all in Kyangwali sub-county for the Kyangwali refugee resettlement camp.

Despite receiving various directives, including two from the President, instructing the Office of the Prime Minister (OPM) officials to facilitate the return of the residents to their land, they have chosen to turn a deaf ear and disregard the implementation of these directives.

In 2016 and 2018, President Yoweri Kaguta Museveni issued directives to resettle PAPs back to their ancestral land, but unfortunately, these directives remained unimplemented.

In 2021, Prime Minister Robinah Nabbanja visited the victims and promised action, which, as of the time of writing this article, it’s yet to be realized.

On March 1, 2022, Minister of Relief, Disaster Preparedness, and Refugees, Mr. Hilary Onek, accused the victims of encroaching on government land. He also criticized local leaders and officials for potential involvement in stage-managed evictions.

In 2022, approximately 1,000 of the evictees camped at the office of the Kikuube Resident District Commissioner, Amlan Tumusiime, demanding his intervention to help them return to their land. Unfortunately, this intervention did not materialize. Some of the evictees sought shelter in temporary shelters provided by Florence Natumanya, the Kikuube Woman MP, and Francis Kazini, the Buhaguzi Member of Parliament, while others continued to search for livelihoods in other parts of the country.

“People are suffering immensely, and we are witnessing deaths without having a proper place to bury our loved ones. No one is coming to our rescue, and it’s heartbreaking to see our children deprived of education, as they are the future of tomorrow,” expressed the community members in an interview with Witness Radio.

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DEFENDING LAND AND ENVIRONMENTAL RIGHTS

Breaking: A community land rights defender in the Kiryandongo district is charged with assault and released on a cash bail.

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By Witness Radio team.

Magistrate Court sitting in Kiryandongo district has released a community land rights defender on a cash bail. He was arbitrarily arrested, and detained Thursday, February 29th, 2024, for attempting to open a criminal case against Great Seasons SMC Limited workers for erasing his 3 acres of land with ready-to-harvest cash crops.

Mwawula Fred’s release came after spending five (5) days in detention. Mr. Mwawula is a community land rights defender based in Kisalanda village, Mutunda parish, Kiryandongo district help to mobilize communities to resist forced land grabbing by multinational companies in Kiryandongo district.

The prosecution alleges that Mwawula assaulted workers of the Great Seasons SMC Company Limited who were in his garden.

The Penal Code Act, Cap 120, states that any person who commits an assault occasioning actual bodily harm commits a misdemeanor and is liable to imprisonment for five years on conviction.

On February 22nd, 2024, Witness Radio ran an article about four Great Seasons SMC Limited Company workers with a numberless tractor who had invaded and erased Mwawula’s garden with crops ready for harvest such as maize, green pepper, and tomatoes in Kisalanda village.

When he (Mwawula) went to Kiryandongo Central Police Station to open up criminal cases against the company, he was instead arbitrarily arrested, detained by local police, and preferred an assault charge before appearing before the court.

While granting the defender bail, Her Worship Amweno Hellen released Mr. Mwawula on a cash bail of 700,000 Ugx (Equivalent to 178.47 USD) while the sureties conditioned a non-cash bail.

The defender will report back to Court on the 13th/March/ 2024.

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DEFENDING LAND AND ENVIRONMENTAL RIGHTS

Breaking: A community land rights defender in Kiryandongo, who was arrested for attempting to open a case against company workers at Kiryandongo Central police for erasing his garden, is facing assault charges.

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By Witness Radio team.

Kiryandongo Central police have preferred an assault charge against a community land rights defender who was arbitrarily arrested and detained Thursday, February 29th, 2024, for attempting to open a criminal charge against workers of Great Seasons SMC Limited.

On February 22nd, 2024, four Great Seasons SMC Limited Company workers with a tractor invaded and erased Mr. Mwawula Fred’s garden with crops ready for harvest such as maize, green pepper, and tomatoes. The workers used a numberless company tractor to destroy the defender’s 3 acres of crops.

According to the police charge sheet, Mwawula allegedly assaulted workers of the Great Seasons SMC Company Limited who were in his garden.

Defender’s lawyers said Mwawula bravely tried to intervene to stop the destruction of his crops by company workers, but they (workers) callously persisted with their destructive actions, disregarding the defender’s pleas.

The lawyers also stated that company workers made off with sacks full of maize belonging to their client.

The Penal Code Act, Cap 120, states that any person who commits an assault occasioning actual bodily harm commits a misdemeanor and is liable to imprisonment for five years on conviction.

Mwawula, on several occasions, has been in and out of prison on several charges over eight times for mobilizing local communities to resist land grabbing and forceful evictions by multinational companies in the Kiryandongo district. However, the court has dismissed all of them for want of prosecution.

Frequently, the gardens belonging to smallholder farmers, activists, and defenders have been targeted and vandalized by Great Seasons SMC Company Limited, demanding that the local community should vacate what the company asserts as its land. In a distressing incident last December 2023, many defenders’ gardens were set ablaze by workers of the company, resulting in a prolonged famine within projected affected families.

The defender is yet to be produced in court to answer to assault charges.

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