Landslide victims demand more land and relief food

Poor quality. Some of the families display the sub-standard maize seedlings at Bunambutye resettlement site in Bulambuli District on June 2. PHOTO BY FRED WAMBEDE.

What you need to know:

  • The resettlement site is currently hosting about 241 families comprising more than 4,000 people, who were relocated from different landslide prone-districts in Bugisu Sub-region.

The landslide victims at Bunambutye resettlement site in Bulambuli District are protesting the decision by the district leaders to allocate them one acre of land for farming instead of the two that had been proposed by the government.
The victims also expressed fear of starvation, saying they were not able to plant crops this season because the district leaders did not allocate and plough their farmland in time as pledged by officials from OPM.
They added that the maize seedlings, which were distributed to them, arrived late and were spoilt.

“We are not happy with our leaders. They are mistreating us and now they are proposing to give us one acre instead of two,” Mr Nathan Wilson Wanasolo, the chairperson of the landslide victims, said.
Mr David Watasa, another victim and the secretary for education at the site, added that some of the leaders have threatened them with evictions should they reject the one acre of land.

One of the district leaders said they received money amounting to Shs400 million for ploughing the land from OPM this financial year but the contract was given to one of the leaders with limited manpower.
“The contract was awarded to one of our colleagues, who had no manpower and capacity to handle the task,” the source, who preferred anonymity, said.
The Chief Administrative Officer (CAO), Mr Andrew Chelangat, acknowledged in an interview with Daily Monitor that they received Shs400 million for ploughing the land for the victims.

“We are now partitioning the land, which has been ploughed but we are going to give them one acre per family. When we open up more land, we will add them another acre,” he said.
Mr Chelangat explained that the delay to open up the land was due to difficulties in processing of the funds.
“As for the issue of fake seedlings, we are going to investigate,” he said.
Mr Peter Pax Paak, the RDC Bulambuli, urged the victims to first receive one acre as they wait for more.
“The government land is there and we have held several meetings with them over the same matter,” he said.

Relocating
New home
The resettlement site is currently hosting about 241 families comprising more than 4,000 people, who were relocated from different landslide prone-districts in Bugisu Sub-region. The relocation exercise started in May, 2019.
The original plan by the officials from OPM indicates that each family was to get a two-bed room house, sitting on one acre, two acres for farming, among other necessities until they are in position to look after themselves.
Most of the land had been not been ploughed by Tuesday when Daily Monitor visited the place.