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Nakaseke — Mr John Bahigi, 68, a resident of Kinyogoga Sub-county in Nakaseke District, owns more than 80 acres of land with a lease title. His family has stayed on this land since 1961.
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He was, however, shocked after strangers turned up from nowhere in 2016, to claim ownership of his land. They confronted him with instructions to survey the land his family had occupied for 55 years.
The suspicious people, in 2016, displayed a land title similar to the one in his possession, claiming ownership of his land.
“After cross-checking that the land title I had was the genuine one from the office of the registrar, I walked up to the office of the Commissioner of Lands to register my complaint. I was tossed around for more than six months,” Mr Bahigi narrates to Daily Monitor.
“Lucky enough, the registrar had already verified within the Lands ministry system that the title I possessed was genuine. When they turned up for surveying for the second time, I alerted other residents and we arrested them and handed them over to the police. This was the last time I heard about them,” Mr Bahigi further narrates.
Mr Bahigi said he suspected connivance from the Ministry of Lands for the double issuance of two land tittles on the same piece of land. Mr Joseph Ssentamu, 55, another resident of Nabbika village re-echoes a slightly similar challenge.
He claims his family has settled on land measuring 100 acres since 1948, only to receive an eviction notice from Buganda Land Board Ltd, a corporate body mandated by the Kabaka to manage the Buganda Kingdom land.
Shocker
“I was surprised when people claiming to be agents from Buganda Land Board told us to vacate the land, claiming that it had been leased out. Surprisingly, the 100-acre land on Plot 1,029, Nabbika Estate, is also claimed by Nakaseke District Land Board. We are surprised that Mengo does not know where their land ends. Our relief is that Nakaseke District Land Board has taken over the matter. We also recently received a message from Mengo disassociating themselves from eviction threats on this land. We are left with unanswered questions about who was behind the destruction of our property, including food in an effort to force us off this land,” Mr Ssentamu said in an interview.
But the Buganda Kingdom information minister, Mr Nuwa Kiyimba, told Daily Monitor in an interview on Friday that whatever interventions Buganda has made regarding land registration and management programmes is in the best interest of the people of Buganda.
Two months ago, Nakaseke South MP Ssemakula Lutamaguzi raised a red flag in Parliament. He said more than 20,000 people had been evicted from five villages in Nakaseke South and many others were living under fear of eviction from their land.
He claimed that well connected people, whom he did not name, were behind the evictions and called on government to investigate the claims.
Deputy Attorney General Mwesigwa Rukutana, however, denied involvement of “big shots” in government in land grabbing. Local leaders have stepped up advocacy about their plight but feel government has turned a deaf ear.
Like Mr Lutamaguzi, they point to some powerful officials, including soldiers who have made it a habit to evict bona fide tenants from their land with impunity and without following the law.
Analysts say
Analysts attribute the problem to the fact that there is vast idle land available in areas such as Nakaseke, which attracts people from other parts of the country to settle on it thinking it is vacant land. But local leaders claim the problem is a result of speculators, especially those in government, who buy huge pieces of land with a plan to sell it in future at a higher price, but the land has sitting tenants and they fail to compensate them.
Mr Johnson Kamuhangire, district councillor representing people with disability, said: “We are puzzled with the land eviction problem in Nakaseke District. We have about 17,000 families which face eviction in different parts of the district.”
Mr Fred Rwabirinda, the Nakaseke District councillor representing Kinyogoga Sub-county, claims senior government officials working with top security agencies, have fenced off vast areas in the district, leaving residents without land for farming and grazing.
The most affected areas include Nabbika village, where 200 families are threatened with eviction, Naluvule village, where 400 families face eviction and hundreds of others have already been pushed off their land.
In the neigbouring Luweero District, the situation is not different. A total of 2,000 families were also recently issued with an eviction notice to vacate a piece of land measuring 14 square miles in Kakulubita Sub-county.
Recently, President Museveni instituted a commission of inquiry into land matters led by Justice Catherine Bamugemereire.
Background
Nakaseke District is a hotbed for land disputes. The district sits on 3,477.3 square kilometres of land, according to Mr Kato Ramathan, the district information officer.
The district has an estimated population of 208,000 people, according to the 2016 District statistics, although the 2014 Population and Housing Census put the population at 197,369.
The population in Nakaseke depends on farming and cattle keeping for a livelihood.
Source: The monitor
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