TAMKO LA JUVICUF JUU YA UTAPELI WA KUTOA GESI MTWARA

M'Kiti wa Jumuiya ya Vijana Ya Chama Cha Wananchi-CUF, Leo ameongea na Vyombo vya Habari. Na haya ndio Maelezo ya Press ya Leo.
NI HAKI YA MSINGI KABISA WANANCHI WA MKOA WA MTWARA KUANDAMANA KUPINGA GESI KUPELEKWA DAR ES SALAAM.WAKATI HAWAJUI HATIMA YAO.
TAREHE: 05/01/2013

Jumuiya ya vijana CUF Taifa inaendelea kuunga mkono harakati zinazoendelea mkoani Mtwara za kupinga mpango wa serikali wa kujenga bomba la kusafirishia gesi asilia kutoka mtwara hadi dare s salaam, jumuiya ya vijana CUF taifa inaamini gesi inahamishwa kwa matakwa ya watu Fulani na sio kwa manufaa ya taifa kama inavyoelezwa na serikali, jumuiya haioni sababu ya kiuchumi ya kuhamisha gesi Mtwara kupeleka Dar es salaam au sehemu nyingine yeyote ile kwa kuzingatia yafuatayo:-

1. Uamuzi wa kuhamisha gesi sio wa kiuchumi na haukuzingatia misingi ya kiuchumi kwani kama serikali ingeamua kujenga mitambo ya kufulia gesi (Plants) mkoani Mtwara ingeokoa mabilioni ya pesa yanayotumika kusafirishia gesi asilia toka Mtwara kwenda Dar es Salaam, inasemekana bomba moja la mita tano (5) inagharimu fedha za kitanzania takribani bilioni tatu (3), hii ni hatari tujiulize umbali uliopo kati ya Mtwara na Dar nikilometa ngapi? Kwani ni zaidi ya kilometa 560 mara hiyo bilioni 3 tunazani ni pesa kiasi gani zitatumika kwa ajli ya mradi huo?kwanini wasifanye opportunity cost ya kujenga hizo plants Mtwara? ili kuokoa gharama za usafirishaji wa gesi wanasafirisha na wanaenda kujenga plants nyingine Dar hivi hatuoni Taifa linaingia gharama mara mbili?

2. Ujenzi wa vinu vya kufulia gesi asilia Mtwara utasaidia kuchochea maendeleo ya mikoa ya kusini kwa kuwahakikishia ajira vijana ambao kila siku wanapanga mikakati ya kwenda Dar kutafuta ajira na maisha bora! Lazima Taifa lifanye diversification of economy kwani hata mataifa ya Ulaya na Marekani yalifanikiwa kwa kufanya diversification of economy sio kila mradi tuupeleke Dar es Salaam, tunasababisha population na kufanya uchumi kuwa concentrated in a single area hii ni hatari kwa mipango ya muda mrefu ya taifa hili.

3. Kujengwa kwa mitambo hiyo katika mikoa ya kusini itasaidia kuchochea maendeleo ya miundo mbinu mbalimbali kama barabara, bandari, na reli kwa lazima serikali itajenga miundo mbinu imara kwa ajili ya kusafirisha gesi iliyo tayari kwa kutumiwa na watumiaji mbalimbli kutoka mikoa tofauti tofauti, Taifa linahitaji mawazo yakinifu ya kuwasaidia wananchi wenye kipato cha chini hasa wanaotoka mikoa ya kusini.

Jumuiya ya vijana inashangazwa na kauli tata inayotolewa na viongozi wa Serikali ya CCM kwani ikumbukwe kuwa tarehe 25/07/2011 kwenye maadhimisho ya siku ya mashujaa Rais Kikwete aliwahutubia wananchi wa Mtwara na kuwahakikishia kuwa katika utawala wake atainua mikoa ya kusini kiviwanda na kumtaka Meya wa Manispaa ya Mtwara – Mikindani kutenga maeneo kwa ajili ya wawekezaji, wananchi wanahoji utawala wake unaelekea ukingoni hauna hata dalili ya kiwanda kimoja badala yake kunazoezi la kutaka kuhamisha gesi hiyo na kupelekwa Dar es Salaam, je hivi kweli Rais Kikwete na CCM yake wana mapenzi ya dhati na watu wa kusini?
Jumuiya ya vijana CUF Taifa inaendelea kushangazwa na taarifa ya Waziri wa nishati na madini Mheshimwa Sospeter Muhongo kwa kudai kuwa eti asilimia kumi na nne (14%)tu ya gesi iliyogunduliwa ndiyo inatoka Mtwara, kwanini sasa wasipeleke mradi huo wa bomba la kusafirishia gesi sehemu nyingine badala ya Mtwara? Jumuiya inasisitiza kuwa wanamtwara hawapingi gawio la pato linalotokana na gesi kutumika sehemu nyingine yeyote ya nchi, kwani ikumbukwe kuwa hata kwenye ushuru wa zao la korosho ambalo limekuwa zao la pili kuingizia ushuru wa Taifa mwaka jana wananchi hawajahoji lolote juu gawio la ushuru huo?

Kwa hiyo Jumuiya ya vijana CUF Taifa inashangazwa na kauli ya viongozi wa CCM ya kusema kuwa wanamtwara wanahitaji gesi iwanufaishe wao wakati ukweli ukijulikana kuwa kilio cha wanamtwara nikutaka uwekezwaji unaotokana na gesi ufanywe Mtwara na Lindi kama ilivyofanywa kwenye viwanda vya sukari, kwani miwa inalimwa Tuliani, Mtibwa, na Kilombero – Morogoro na viwanda viko huko kwa nini gesi iwe Mtwara plant iwekwe Dar es Salaam?

Kwa hiyo Jumuiya ya vijana CUF Taifa inaunga mkono gesi kutosafirishwa kupelekwa Dar es Salaam.

Imetolewa na,
Jumuiya ya Vijana CUF Taifa,

Rais Jakaya Kikwete Azindua Rasmi Ujenzi wa Bomba la Gesi Asilia toka Mtwara hadi Dar es salaam

Rais Jakaya Mrisho Kikwete akizindua rasmi ujenzi wa bomba la gesi asilia toka Mtwara hadi Dar es salaam leo Novemba 8, 2012 maeneno ya Kinyerezi njijini Dar es salaam. Nyuma yake ni Makamu wa Rais Dkt Mohamed Ghalib Bilali.

 Rais Jakaya Mrisho Kikwete na Makamu wa Rais Dkt Mohamed Ghalib Bilali na viongozi wengine wakimsikiliza  Waziri wa Nishati na Madini Profesa Sospeter Muhongo miundombinu ya  bomba la gesi asilia toka Mtwara hadi Dar es salaam leo Novemba 8, 2012 maeneno ya Kinyerezi njijini Dar es salaam. Nyuma yake ni Makamu wa Rais Dkt Mohamed Ghalib Bilali.

Rais Jakaya Mrisho Kikwete akiwa na ujumbe wa kampuni inayojenga bomba la gesi asilia kutoka Mtwata hadi Dar es salaam, Benki ya Exim ya China na viongozi waandamizi wa serikali alipowakaribisha Ikulu kwa mazungumzo baada ya uzinduzi rasmi wa ujenzi wa bomba hilo maeneo ya Kinyerezi jijini Dar es salaam.Picha na IKULU

Oil, Hope and Fear

Lodwar/Lokichar — Although just a few hundred kilometres from Nairobi, the county of Turkana, where newly-confirmed oil reserves are set to go on stream in the next few years, feels more like a million miles away from the gleaming skyscrapers and concentrations of power and money found in Kenya's capital.

Residents of Lokichar, the closest settlement to the viable oil concession, speak of "Kenya" as if it were an entirely different country and of "Kenyans" - or "the people with long trousers" - as if they were foreigners.

Turkana's socioeconomic indicators do indeed set it apart. More than 96 percent of its predominantly pastoralist population are categorized as poor, the highest proportion in the country. Turkana also trails near the bottom of national leagues in terms of employment, literacy and healthcare spending.

Only 39 percent of the youth aged 15-18 in Turkana attend school, compared to the national average of 70.9 percent.

Can oil, coupled with an unprecedented process of political devolution enshrined in a new constitution, reverse Turkana's fortunes?

In Lodwar, the region's main town, where the principal economic activity has long been basket-weaving, there are few positive signs.

Among the new businesses springing up is the Ngamia-1 Mobile Phone Repair Shop, named after the promising oil well. There are also several new hotels, guest houses and restaurants.

Formerly half-empty flights to Lodwar now tend to be fully booked.

Hopes

As climate change, cattle-raiding and agricultural development erode the viability and attraction of the pastoralist livelihood, many in Turkana hope some of their most pressing needs will soon be met.

"Until recently many people did not know what oil as a resource means. Most of them were asking if water could instead be drilled for them," said Lokichar resident Robert Kamaro.

"The government needs to build schools for our children, drill boreholes. We believe that we will benefit, especially the vulnerable," Simon Esekwen, who lives close to Lokichar, told IRIN.

Lodwar resident and doctor Lawrence Lomuria said the oil find was an opportunity for the Turkana people to embrace education. "We do not need to fear education; this can act as a motivator for the Turkana to study and to do well."

"Oil is being seen as a ladder to help the people go up," said Christopher Ekaru Loskipat, coordinator of the Catholic Peace and Justice Commission (CPJC) in Lodwar.

"When the companies come here, the local people expect employment. If this is not done, we are anticipating conflict. What will the government trickle down as the benefit to the community?" he asked.

"We are happy with the oil find," Lokichar resident Lokapel Katilu told IRIN. "We pray that the find is real. We are just idle, there is no work. We just walk around. Before, we would rely on grazing, but the herds have been stolen."

One young resident, who left school before completing his primary education, said: "We understand that we have limited skills, but we would want all those casual jobs given to us."

No jobs bonanza

But according to oil industry analyst Antony Goldman, no major jobs bonanza is on the horizon.

"Typically oil is capital- rather than labour-intensive: unlike mining, it does not yield many unskilled or semi-skilled jobs," he told IRIN.

"In the case of an inland discovery, there may be pipeline construction jobs, and oil does bring - in the boom period of expansion - a range of opportunities in the service sector... The question is the extent to which indigenous communities can compete for any but the most basic tasks," added Goldman, a director of Promedia Consulting, a London-based risk analysis consultancy.

Katilu said that to date he knew of only a few people who had found oil-related work, "to control traffic and to prevent people from accessing the rig site".

Lokichar resident Kamaro said there was a widespread fear that lack of local skills would "lead to people from Kenya coming in" to the area.

People here "are afraid of an influx of foreigners, that there will be congestion, that the foreigners will bring diseases, that their culture will be polluted," said Kamaro.

Others have warned that any oil rush could lead to a rise in crime, prostitution and sexual exploitation of minors.

Child protection challenges

"The coming of oil to an 'illiterate' community will mean an influx of expertise and money and in exchange maybe there will be child protection challenges," warned Eunice Majuma Wasike, a children's officer with the Catholic Diocese of Lodwar.

"If we can empower the community to know about child protection, have legal officers to take up cases pro-bono, have rescue centres in place, then this would help us in addressing the potential protection challenges."

For Joseph Elim, coordinator of Riam Riam, a local NGO, "there is a need to manage people's expectations. Information should be unpacked and the people mobilized to receive information, and feedback collected and monitored."

"I heard some people ask, 'What will happen to pastoralists?' or 'Will they deport us to Sudan?' There is a need for information to counter the alarmists. The people are saying: 'We do not want people with long trousers coming here because they have colluded with those who have sold the land'," he added.

These attitudes chime with Goldman's analysis that in the longer term the real impact of the oil find will be on "land prices and government revenue... The challenge for the industry in Kenya will be to develop an inclusive strategy that benefits all stakeholders," he said.

Patrick Imana, an official with the Agency for Pastoralist Development (APaD), another local NGO, put it more bluntly: "Will we see militias like in Nigeria or the elite looting oil riches?"

Mindful of the "resource curse" risks that have plagued other African countries with major oil reserves, the Kenyan government has professed its commitment to ensuring "natural resources should generate long-term economic and social benefits for the country and in particular for the host communities."

"This will involve reviewing the existing legal and regulatory framework to conform to best international practice and to align it with the new constitutional dispensation," the Ministry of Energy adds on its website.

There are hopes that the new constitution, adopted with overwhelming public support in 2010, will help reverse decades of marginalization and check the endemic corruption that continues to pervade the highest echelons of power in Nairobi. (In Transparency International's 2011 corruption index, Kenya was ranked 154 out of 182 countries, i.e. near the bottom).

"Devolution will help to remove fear. We will have a county assembly in Lodwar," said APAD's Imana. "We need a vibrant county assembly with civil society activists to take the government to task," he added.

Title deeds

People in Turkana are also worried about being left out of any appreciation of land prices that are likely to arise from development of the oil field. Land in the county is communally owned, and managed by the county council.

"When the oil was found, people started saying, 'Now we are in Kenya, good things are coming out of this place'. But coming from a pastoral community that did not attach monetary value to land, now [they wonder]: 'What about this whole mass of land that investors are going to be interested in'?" explained Riam Riam's Elim.

"Here we do not have title deeds, people live without documents," said the CPJC's Loskipat.

"The situation will be threatening for those without land documents and some people may capitalize on this. There is a possibility that at the end of the day the vulnerable will easily give away their land or sell it at throwaway prices," he said.

Others fear that the Turkana people's closest neighbours and historical resource-conflict adversaries, the Pokot, may also try to claim land near the oil installations.

"There is a need for security to protect us from the hostile communities around us," warned Elim, noting that the region was awash with small arms.

"We need to wake up from the slumber [delusion] that if the people are attacked, it is [just] their culture, or a normal conflict around water and pasture: oil will raise the stakes," he added.

And for some, the very concept of individual land ownership is as alien as the "men in long trousers". "How can you sell soil?" asked one young man in Lokichar.

This report does not necessarily reflect the views of the United Nations.

http://allafrica.com/stories/201205300892.html

Land Grabbing in Oil Region

Somewhere in Hoima district the small sub county of Kyangwali is home to one of the Albertine's biggest oil fields - Kingfisher - said to be one of the largest oil wells in the basin with over 300 million barrels of oil. Unfortunately Kyangwali is also the site of growing land disputes, with powerful politicians and military officials scrambling to take possession of huge tracts of public land and evicting locals.

Residents say that driven by the escalating values of land in the area and the prospect of earning huge compensation from contruction of oil infrastructure in future, powerful people who in the past obtained leases on huge chunks of public land at cheap rates, then sold it for profit, were now crawling out of the wood-work trying to reclaim it.

Minister for Security, Hon. Muruli Mukasa, is at the centre of one such dispute. The locals involved are crying foul.

"Hon. Muruli Mukasa wants to forcefully evict more than 1,000 people from their land which he sold to them so that he can re-possess it and sell afresh to new investors who can pay him much more money than the poor residents who paid him many years ago," reads a petition by the Kyangwali sub county LCIII Chairman, Mazirane Rwemera, to the Prime Minister Amama Mbabazi, dated March 2012.

The residents have also petitioned the Speaker of Parliament, seeking that a team of members of Parliament be dispatched to the sub-county to investigate the matter.

In turn, Muruli Mukasa has accused the community of being a "security threat" and has written several letters to government institutions like police, National Forestry Authority and the Ministry of Water and Environment, seeking to have the community evicted from the land.

The land in question is about 3,000 acres. The minister acquired it in 2001, under a company called Nguuse Ranchers Ltd, which he chairs and co-owns with nine other directors, according to records from the Registrar of Companies.

Under the company, the Minister (then an MP) acquired a 49-year lease at the cost of just Shs 1.8 million from the Hoima District Land Board. Dr. Charles Kajura, then District Veterinary Officer, recommended Nguuse Ranchers Ltd for the lease, noting that the company was going to set up a development project that would develop the area and create jobs.

In his letter to the chairman of the land board, Kajura noted that the company had already started preliminary work with 200 heads of cattle stocked on a 500-acre piece of land nearby and that two sites had been identified for valley dam excavation and construction. Kajura recommended that the Minister and his partners be offered the lease to continue with these capital developments.

However, 11 years down the road, Nguuse Ranchers has only about 60 heads of cattle and there are no dams or other capital developments on the land.

Instead, the Minister and his partners set about selling the land at a profit as soon as they got it.

Sale agreements that The Independent has seen, show that Nguuse Ranchers Ltd started selling the land even before paying lease fees. For instance, while on August 22, 2005, Muruli-Mukasa had sold half of the land (1,500 acres) to a new investor, he had not paid a cent in lease fees and had only covered the survey costs of Shs 1,001,000. He only paid the lease fees - of Shs 856,000 - a year later, on August 21, 2006.

"I have received UGX ten million (10,000,000) from Mr. Ruhambana F. as payment for the 1,500 acres agreed to be sold to him by Nguuse Ranchers Ltd at Nsozi...," read the sale agreement, written on Uganda Parliament letter-headed paper, dated August 21, 2006.

This was one of the many agreements between Nguuse Ranchers and residents, some of which The Independent has seen. All the agreements have one thing in common--an acre of land was sold at Shs 250,000, where the Minister only bought it at a meager Shs 600.

Among the measures the Minister is said to have used to force people off the land is destruction of crops, burning of houses and arrest of people for "trespass".

The residents insist that they bought the land legally from Nguuse Ranchers Limited. The Independent has seen some of the purchase agreements, copies of which are part of the evidence in the petition to the Speaker and Prime Minister's Office.

Muruli-Mukasa on the other hand says that Nguuse Ranchers Ltd did not sell the entire chunk of land it acquired, but only sold to "a few" investors to raise capital to develop the land. However, documents attached to the petition to the speaker show that after the first sale of half the leased land to Ruhambana F., different directors of Nguuse Ranchers continued to call people to buy land.

"...please inform our people - the farmers and those who intend to buy the land that they can prepare and have their money ready so that we can allocate them land to do their work smoothly without any disturbance...," said John Bahemuka, one of the Nguuse Ranchers Ltd directors, in a letter to Yohana Hakizimana, the LCI Chairperson of Wairagaza, Mandwiga village.

Conflict arose when Nguuse Ranchers Ltd told residents not to reveal that they had bought the land, but to tell whoever asked that they were workers of Nguuse Ranchers Ltd, and the rice they were growing was a ranch project. The rice plantations that stretch on as far as the eye can see are impressive, but are not without ecological cost; as thick forests have been cut down to plant them.

"I couldn't accept that," LCI Vice Chairman of Nyamigisha village, Joseph Tusingwire, told The Independent. "I told the minister that I had paid money for the land and there was no way I could accept to be treated by anyone as a worker."

Relations fell apart as the minister tried to evict the residents forcefully.

Residents say that Muruli-Mukasa would deploy army officials to harass them. But they petitioned State House and the commandant officer Major Okolong and his team was reportedly replaced with a more friendly force.

Contrary to the ministers claims that the immigrants were destroying forests and were a potential harbinger of insecurity, one of the UPDF officials told The Independent that they hadn't come across any rebels.

"That is why we are here to ensure security. We have walked those forests inch by inch and I can assure you we haven't come across any rebels there," the officer told The Independent.

Security threat?

The residents have sued the minister in Masindi High Court for damaging crops worth about Shs 400 million. The case is scheduled for hearing on May 30. They claim that with the aid of military officials and police authorities, Muruli-Mukasa had their crops and makeshift houses burnt in an effort to forcefully evict them.

The 'minister's men' are said to have raided villages--sometimes driving cattle through plantations to eat and trample crops, sometimes using Police and army officials to beat up and arrest residents, other times burning homes.

Earlier this year, residents say the Minister's men, with the aid of police, scorched a number of homes and had about four household heads arrested. One of the residents still in detention over trespass charges is 80-year old John Rukijakare, who other residents say had also bought the land from Nguuse Ranchers Limited.

Chris Baguma and his wife Salafina Nyinabaganda say they migrated from Kabale district and bought two acres of land here. They have seven children with four in school.

"One day we were in the house and there was noise all over the place and we came out. We realized houses were on fire so we run," Baguma's 15-year old son, Majuta Samuel, recalls of a raid which his parents say burnt their store-shed with 36 bags of rice and 20 of maize.

In turn, Muruli-Mukasa says the residents taking him on are mostly refugees and immigrants from Congo and Rwanda who want to grab his land.

"These people were not there before me. I challenge them and if they are Ugandans let them prove it... this really is a question of fraudulent people and they have taken money from unsuspecting people," the minister said. "If I had wanted to grab land, I would not have bothered to acquire a lease, if they are customary land owners let them produce evidence..."

Being home to a refugee camp, 90 percent of Kyangwali's population is non-Banyoro.

On March 9, 2012, Muruli-Mukasa wrote to Minister of Water and Environment, Maria Mutagamba, saying that he had information from the Kyangwali Collaborative Forest Management (CFM) committee that foreigners of Rwandese and Congolese origin had invaded and occupied part of the nearby Bugoma Forest in Mandwiga areas with the help of the LCIII Chairperson, Mazirane Rwemera.

"Mr. Mazirane has formed a committee which is forcefully allocating forest land belonging to government to individuals neighbouring the forest reserve," the Minister wrote. "It is reported that the invaders have destroyed the forest and caused insecurity in the area."

In response to Muruli-Mukasa's letter, the Minister of State for Environment, Flavia Nabugere, on March 15 wrote to the executive director of National Forestry Authority:

"I suggest that you dispatch a team to confront the leaders concerned, particularly the Chairman LCIII Mr. Mazirane and those mentioned in the Kyangwali saga, and take remedial action," she instructed.

Muruli-Mukasa had also written to Local Government Minister Adolf Mwesigye, alleging that Mazirane had created illegal villages of Nyamigisa, Rutuza, Kasozi, Mandwiga and Karongo - all located on the land in dispute.

In response, Mwesigye wrote to the Hoima District Chairperson: "I wish to state that I have not approved the new villages...The existence of those villages is therefore illegal. I advise you to communicate this position to the people concerned."

Muruli-Mukasa had also sent Mazirane a warning message by mobile phone, which the local government official later printed out on permission of Buganda Road Court:

"Hullo chairman! Why are you taking our land? What did we do to you? We have been good people. Why are you hurting us? Kindly leave our land alone. Muluri Mukasa, Hon," reads one message which Mazirane showed to The Independent. The number from which the message was sent is also the one on the minister's business card.

Mazirane says the minister had in the past asked him to help evict the people on the land, which he refused to do since he had witnessed many of the land purchases between the locals and Muruli-Mukasa's company. Mazirane said he found the Minister's messages threatening and feared for his life. . He added that he found it strange that the minister accused him of tampering with his land, yet he [Mazirane] owns about 9,000 acres not very far from the land in dispute.

However, according to the Minister, it is Mazirane and the residents he represents, that were hostile. He said they had threatened police and his herdsmen.

"These people [local leaders] keep getting money from these victims of theirs, promising them land, land is not coming," Muruli-Mukasa told journalists at a press conference in March. "One time they are in court, they are in the press everywhere, they made appeals to the very highest office in the land [President's Office], why can't they wait for one process to be completed?"

Other disputes

But the Minister's problems are not just with the locals. Muruli-Mukasa's Nguuse Ranchers Ltd is fighting over the same land with Nsonzi Ranchers, owned by the commandant of Uganda Air Force, Liutenant General Jim Owoyesigyire.

Under his company Owoyesigyire acquired 2,000 acres of land in the area a few years after the Minister under a lease from the Hoima District Land Board. The Minister accuses Owoyesigyire of encroaching on part of his land, and documents from the land board confirm that Owoyesigyire's title laps over a large chunk of the land originally leased to the Minister, hence the dispute.

Although Muruli-Mukasa was the first to acquire land in Kyangwali, Owoyesigire has processed a land title, while the Minister has not, partly because of the dispute. In some of the documents The Independent has seen, Muruli-Mukasa accuses land officials of favouring the Air force boss.

"The land board has a lot of issues," a source privy to the operations of the Hoima District Land Board told this reporter recently. "One of the people processing land titles [District Cartographer Okonyi William] had recently been suspended for forging titles but was reinstated. That is partly why there is all this mess." However, The Independent could not verify this.

In the same sub county, a Col. David Kaboyo, has also been accused by local residents of illicitly acquiring a title on land they had occupied since 1997, and now threatening to evict them.

Separately, another group of villagers in Kyangwali, including Kisoke John of Kyabalongo village is said to be on the run after powerful politicians boarded off land they had acquired from the land board and posted guards to prevent them from accessing it. One of the residents was arrested and Kisoke had his property, including about six goats and 14 chickens, confiscated by Police. These locals have written a complaint to the Director of Public Prosecutions about the loss of their belongings in Police hands.

The land conflicts in Hoima district, brewing 10 kms from the Kingfisher oil field, throw the lid off the manner in which the rise of land values in the region around Lake Albert following the discovery of an estimated 2.5 billion barrels of oil, has upset the balance of local relationships and threatened local livelihoods.

The disputes also expose how government, military officials and business people are using their clout to take advantage of Uganda's land systems to acquire large tracts of public land at the expense of poor people who do not have land titles. It is also a testimony to how oil has transformed a previously valueless but peaceful wilderness left to baboons and refugees, into a Mecca for the greedy and ambitious.

Entering Kyangwali after a bumpy three-hour drive through the thick Bugoma Forest from Hoima town, one comes across a small town bustling with business. There are several passenger cars and a few trucks transporting merchandise. But it is Mazirane's new 30-roomed building that is turning heads.

No wonder speculation is rife that he acquired it out of money from allocating land to the foreigners prospecting for oil.

"But that Mazirane also, how did he get that whole land he owns? Did you see the building he is erecting? Where is that money coming from?" a local civil society activist asked in a discussion of the issues of Kyangwali.

Mazirane owns about 1,000 acres of land, part of which he rents out to farmers. His building is intended to tap into the influx of people seeking oil fortunes.

But it is not just the oil that has fuelled the development here. Residents say the land in Kyangwali is so fertile and rice grows very well. It is said that the residents on the 3,000 acres Muruli-Mukasa claims alone, including the Vice Chairman LCI, Nyamigisha village, Joseph Tusingwire, produce one ton of rice per acre per season. Out of just 1,000 acres of land, these cultivators can produce about 20,000 bags of rice (2 tonnes) every three months. These figures might sound unrealistic on paper, especially considering that these are local farmers using rudimentary tools, but the sight of the vast plantations of rice and other crops here, shows the reality.

http://allafrica.com/stories/201205291002.html