Will Parliament pass new landlord-tenant Bill?

Kampala City traders under their Kampala City Traders Association (Kacita) umbrella body must be in a jubilating mood following Cabinet’s decision to have a new landlord-tenant law approved. The law seeks to protect the rights of both the tenant and landlord. Two drafts of this law have been passed by Cabinet in a period of less than two weeks.
The first draft law, initially announced by State minister for Housing, Dr Chris Baryomunsi, was approved early this month. Two weeks later, his senior, the minister in charge of the entire Lands and Housing docket, Ms Betty Amongi, announced a few amendments to the law following a mixed public reaction on the matter.

Amongi said the amendment of the new Bill followed objections from landlords under their umbrella body of Uganda Developers Association led by tycoon Godfrey Kirumira. Baryomunsi said the Bill is about to be presented on the floor of Parliament.
The Cabinet’s final decision followed complaints since 2005 from city traders who have been at the mercy of landlords charging exorbitant rent fees.
Among other things, the Bill seeks to introduce a tribunal that will settle agreements arising from disagreement of the two parties.
The Bill also wants tenancy agreement between the two parties to be mandatory by law.

At the moment, most tenants are not able to accrue tax benefits arising from the rental expenditure because landlords are non-committal when it comes to issuance of rental receipts.
In February, the leadership of Kacita in a petition to Prime Minister, Dr Ruhankana Rugunda, asked government to approve the Bill without any further delay. The traders had threatened to organise a mass demonstration to express their dissatisfaction over the matter.

Although Dr Baryomunsi had indicated that under the new arrangement, the landlords would be requested to first get court orders before evicting any defaulting tenant, Ms Amongi on her part said getting a court order was not necessary, but the landlord needs to get consent from area Local Council officials and police before carrying out the eviction.
On the preface, the Bill as it is seeks to appease a group of tenants, saving them from arbitrarily rent and utility increments. This is indeed applaudable on the ministry’s part. The Bill did not separate tenants of residential and commercial properties. According to Dr Baryomunsi, the Bill was passed following complaints from a group of tenants under their bodies Uganda Tenants and Settlers Association UTENSA and Kacita.

Did Cabinet attempt to find out the differences between the circumstances surrounding tenants of residential properties and commercial properties? Will Members of Parliament pass this Bill which seems to soothe tenants at the expense of landlords? Media reports show that most of the commercial and developed residential buildings are owned by politicians and other powerful individuals in State House and government who, however, happen to hire some “tycoons” as agents to manage them.

Even the few “landlords” who are accused of charging rent in dollars might have been receiving orders from their behind the scenes “bosses”.
Because of the leadership laws which require politicians and government officials to declare their wealth, the Inspector General of Government recently said there is an increase in cases of officials that have resorted to register their properties in the names of their children and other third parties in order to evade the law.

This applies well to the known city “landlords” who are real owners only during day but the status changes at night or dawn when they have to show accountability before the “real owners”.
Therefore, will MPs get the audacity to pass a Bill that seeks to directly target their revenue from rent so as to appease the tenants.
Secondly, do the agitators of this Bill know that they will not be tenants forever but at one point also become landlords and feel the sting of this Bill? I wait to watch Members of Parliament passing a law that favours tenants at their own expense.

The writer is a journalist based in Kampala