Kabaka wants Makerere land returned to him

Buganda King, Kabaka Ronald Mutebi has written to government asking it to return to him 92.72 acres of land that currently houses Makerere University main campus.
The king, according to information available to Saturday Monitor asked to repossess the land through the Buganda Land Board which wrote to the Minister for Lands about the decision. The land is contained on file No. FC14110, Makerere, Kibuga, Plot 14024 Makerere Hill Road FA 92.72 acres.

Sources within both Makerere University and the Ministry of Lands have indicated that the land on which the university seats has various titles a number of whose leases have expired.
Investigations by Sunday Monitor show that among other plots on which the current CCE Hall, Lumumba and Faculty of Technology lie- have all expired while titles for Livingstone and Africa halls expired but were renewed for 75 years. We were not able to establish when the new leases were issued.

Expired leases
But leases for the land housing the Faculty of Law and the Makerere Institute for Social Research (MISR) also expired and are yet to be renewed.
On May 18, Ms Sarah Kulata Basangwa, a senior commissioner in the Lands Ministry, wrote on behalf of the permanent secretary to the Makerere University Secretary about the Kabaka’s demand.

“This office has received a request from Buganda Kingdom land board acting for on behalf of His Highness the Kabaka of Buganda requesting that the above land be returned to him,” Ms Basangwa wrote adding, “They assert that all the land on Makerere hill, where the University is situated was leased to the then Governor of Uganda and a title issued in favour of a technical school.”

Ms Basangwa asked the university to assist her office in coming to a conclusion by availing a copy of the certificate of title. The matter was then referred to the university legal department which was tasked with liaising with the estates manager to advise on a way forward.

Eviction threat
But sources say an internal meeting within the university revealed Uganda’s biggest and oldest public university faced a real danger of possible eviction after it was revealed that many titles of individual plots on which the sprawling campus lies had expired.
The Vice Chancellor, Prof. Venansius Baryamureba, said on Thursday he was not aware of the move on the university land but was quick to add that he believed reason would prevail against evicting such a big public institution.

“Buganda is interested in promoting education, the government of Uganda is interested in promoting education. I don’t think anyone would want to evict the university which is a public institution. Even if the university is supported by government, it is not owned by the government but the public. It is a key institution providing a service to the country and to the region,” Prof. Baryamureba stated.

He said Makerere University land was becoming “a serious issue” and even before these new threats a decision had been made “to check every title and those found to have expired ,efforts have been made to renew them.”

Prof. Baryamureba added that a decision had been made to hire a surveyor on a permanent basis to document all the university land. He added, however, that any expired titles ought to be renewed, “I do agree that if the lease has expired it should be renewed and if it expired and we did not renew then we should pay from the time it expired.”

Lands Minister Omara Atubo said he was not aware of the claim from Buganda Kingdom. “I don’t think that has to my attention, this is the first time you are telling me about it.” He said he believed the technical people were still trying to handle the matter at that level.

But a senior source within Buganda confirmed that the kingdom had written to the registrar of lands about the Makerere University land. “It’s not just Makerere, it is part of a big investigation that started in 2001 to trace all land titles that belong to the kingdom,” the official who cannot be named because he is not authorised to speak on behalf of the king or the kingdom said.

He said the aim was not to disposes current users of the land but rather to document the land and create ground for negotiations with current users first to recognise legitimate ownership and benefit from usufruct (a legal term meaning that as legal title owner one is entitled to any revenue that might accrue from the property).

Sunday Monitor has established that Prince David Wassajja, Buganda attorney general Apollo Makubuya and information minister Charles Peter Mayiga have been part of the land search and documentation effort.

Mr Makubuya told this newspaper: “I am aware of that (request to reposes Makerere University land), that land belongs to the kingdom and it was leased to the technical college, that lease expired.”

Age-old conflict
But on the Makerere land, our investigations revealed that while the university was first established in 1922 as a college, a conflict over the land first emerged in 1942 after then Prime Minister of Buganda Martin Luther Nsibirwa allowed the college to lease part of the land.

Nsibirwa was later murdered at Namirembe Cathedral in the 1950s. The then colonial governor negotiated a settlement and secured a lease in the name of Makerere College Council and compulsorily acquired the stretch up to Bwaise for which a free hold title was issued.

Buganda has been demanding from the central government some 350sq miles comprised under the royal estate under the Kabaka and some 9000sq miles formerly crown land that had been vested in the control of the central government among other unreturned properties.
Makerere University boasts prominent alumni in the region including former Tanzanian President Benjamin Mkapa and Kenya’s Mwai Kibaki.