Kasokoso locals clash with security over relief food
Happy. Some the beneficiaries of government relief food jubilate after receiving their packages in Kasokoso, Kira Municipality in Wakiso District yesterday. PHOTO BY ABUBAKER LUBOWA.
What you need to know:
- A police officers who was on ground but did not want to be identified since he is not authorised to speak to the media, said some children were not being given food because the orders had changed.
Residents of Kasokoso in Kira Division, Wakiso District, yesterday clashed with security officials distributing food in the area for sidelining their children during the exercise.
The Minister of Kampala, Ms Betty Amongi, while addressing the media at the Uganda Media Centre in Kampala on Tuesday said every individual in a homestead irrespective of his or her age should be given 6kgs of posho and 3kgs of beans each.
However, the process was different in Kasokoso.
A number of children below the age of eight years were yesterday not given food, something that angered some residents, who questioned the security officials why their children were not given their share as stipulated by the government.
Not happy
“Why have you not given my son food? The government said all individuals in the house must be given a share. This boy also eats food and I think you should have given him his share as well,” Ms Madinah Nakiwala, a mother of a two-year-old boy, asked an official who handed food to her.
Ms Nakiwala told Daily Monitor that if her child could not be given the maize flour and beans, then the distribution team should have given him milk and sugar if they thought he could not eat posho.
Another family with three children, all above three years old, was not amused with the distribution teams after they gave all the three children one pack of 6kgs of maize flour and 3kg of beans as opposed to giving each one of them their own packages.
“These children are old. They also eat a lot of food so they should have been given their share as the government said. I am a mechanic and I lost my job due to the lockdown,” Mr John Okuka, the father of the three children, said.
Ms Rose Nakayiza, the old Kasokoso Village chairperson, said the initial arrangement by the government was to give food to each individual in the family, but she does not know why this arrangement was changed.
She also said the distribution teams were supposed to give milk to breastfeeding mothers and sugar, but only mothers with children below the age of seven months were given milk.
Some residents in houses with wall fences were sidelined, but some of them, upon citing the distribution team, attacked them and demanded to be given food.
The distribution team had no option but to give them food as well.
All residents who receive food are registered by a team from Red Cross before receiving the food, while those who are not found at home are not given because they are perceived to be among the essential workers.
A police officers who was on ground but did not want to be identified since he is not authorised to speak to the media, said some children were not being given food because the orders had changed.
“We received fresh orders that even when there are 10 people in a household, we should not give them more than four packs of 6kgs of maize flour and 3kgs of beans because other people also have to get,” the police officers said.
By press time, we could not get Ms Amongi’s comment on why children were not receiving their share as she had earlier communicated.
