Mabira: Activists dare government

President says only degraded part of forest will be given out

Conservationists yesterday vowed to take President Museveni head-on over his renewed plan to push through a proposal to give away part of Mabira Forest for sugar cane growing. Addressing district leaders and agriculturalists at Entebbe State House on Saturday, President Museveni said failure to give away the forest in 2007, is partly to blame for the current sugar crisis in the country.

However, in what might lead to a repeat of the 2007 protests against the proposed give-away in which three people were killed, activists and politicians have condemned the President’s latest move and vowed to fight to save the forest.

“We are having a meeting tomorrow to reconvene the Save Mabira Committee to consider a way forward and we are going to take him [Museveni] head on to ensure that the forest is saved,” said environmentalist and Kitgum Woman MP, Beatrice Anywar, who also spearheaded the 2007 protests.

President Museveni wants to give part of the 7,100 hectares of the forest to the Sugar Corporation of Uganda Limited (Scoul), a Lugazi-based company owned by Mehta group of companies. He said: “Lugazi Sugar Works should expand by getting part of the Mabira Forest reserve which they had asked for. They were stopped by riots which were led by Beatrice Anywar and since they were stopped from growing [more sugar cane], the country is short of sugar and it is going to import sugar. Imagine how Uganda can import sugar?” he said, promising to ‘crush’ anyone who will oppose his move.

But in a telephone interview with Daily Monitor yesterday, Ms Anywar said that blackmailing Ugandans and passing blame has becoming President Museveni’s strategy whenever he fails to deliver. “Bringing the Mabira issues, which even led to the death of several Ugandans-who have even never been compensated- is very sad and inconsiderate,” she said.

She added: “Metha should not forget that for his business to flourish in Uganda he needs to be in harmony with the natives.”
Mbarara Municipality MP Medard Bitekyerezo yesterday said the President’s move is bound to affect the climate of the country as many districts, including Jinja, Kayunga and Kampala use the forest as a rain catchment point.

Climate concern
“The climate of this country is more important than sugar,” he said. “Ugandans can survive without sugar but they can’t survive without oxygen or a green environment. The President should not look at today but future and I kindly beg him to keep off the forest and save it.”

Kampala Central legislator and member of the parliamentary committee on Natural Resources Mohammed Nsereko, said President Museveni’s move is bad, uncalled for and should not be supported by any sane legislator. “There is a lot that this country wants than giving away Mabira forest. You cannot trade off the environment in exchange for sugar and I will not support that move at any one time,” he said.

“You can’t say the solution is giving away Mabira yet there has been sugar hoarding. These investors have received a lot of free things over the past decades but they instead repatriate millions of dollars. Why don’t they use the profits to buy land elsewhere?”

But in his response, the Presidential Press Secretary Tamale Mirundi, said the President does not mean giving out the entire forest but ‘just the degraded part.” “President Museveni is an environmentalist. That forest was saved by NRM when it came to power,” he said.

“The President is not talking about giving away those trees that you see while going to Jinja; that’s a misrepresentation of facts to deliberately portray a wrong picture. There is a part of the forest that was not saved from encroachment and that’s what the President meant.”

Veteran politician and Constituent assembly legislator Darlington Sakwa, said Mr Museveni is using the sugar scarcity to divert people from the main economic problems that he [President] has failed to solve. “Sugar has become scarce because government has allowed the producers to take all the sugar to South Sudan and not because of lack of land to plant sugarcane,” he said, adding that the President’s economic indiscipline, too, has contributed to the crisis.

“He poured all the local currency in the economy during campaigns and went ahead to deplete the foreign reserves by buying fighter jets and he now wants to divert attention. “There has never been a sugar crisis between 2007 and this year; is it the Anywar’s who have stopped him from equipping hospitals and improving on the education standards? He should stop the blame game and focus on the issues,” he said.

But in an email to Daily Monitor, State House deputy Press Secretary Linda Nabusayi said the President was misquoted and that President Museveni said plantation owners should be engaged and supported to expand production to meet the growing demand.

“Lugazi sugar plantation owned by the Mehta Group would get the degraded forest land in Mabira for expansion. While the Monitor made reference only to Mabira, the President’s address also focused on expansion of land in Kinyara and acquiring of land in Amuru for the same purposes; to expand sugar production,” the email read in part.

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President’s comment on Mabira Forest exaggerated, says State House

• The statement below was sent to Daily Monitor by the State House press office yesterday.
• Please refer to a story published by the Sunday Monitor Newspaper under the headline “Mabira Must Go, Museveni tells district officials,” Monitor 14th, 2011.
• While addressing district leaders and technocrats at a conference on Agriculture Productivity at State House in Entebbe, in a televised address, President Museveni said plantation owners should be engaged and supported to expand production to meet the growing demand.
• He also said that Lugazi sugar plantation owned by the Mehta Group would get the degraded forest land in Mabira for expansion. While the Monitor made reference only to Mabira, the President’s address also focused on expansion of land in Kinyara and acquiring of land in Amuru for the same purposes; to expand sugar production.
• For the Monitor to insinuate in their headline that the Mabira Forest would be given away was to stoke public hatred and anger over a matter they deliberately quoted out of context.
• We hope that the Daily Monitor newspaper will take it as their obligation, responsibility and duty to clarify these deliberate distortions to avoid misleading the public.