Challenges await newly-elected district chairpersons in Lango
The district speaker, Mr Chris Ongom, helps a visitor wade through a flooded road in Loro Sub-county in Oyam District. PHOTO | BILL OKETCH
What you need to know:
- Impassable roads. Mr Asanti Odongo, the Apac District chair-elect, said his administration will prioritise education and roads. In Apac, many roads become impassable during the rainy season. For instance the road connecting Akokoro Sub-county to the newly created Apoi Sub-county was last year cut off by floods from Lake Kwania. Currently, people are now using boats to access Apoi Health Centre III and Akokoro Senior Secondary School.
- Another road connecting Apac to Masindi Port Ferry is also cut off by floods from River Nile at Aganga Parish in Ibuje Sub-county. This road has now been abandoned. Aganga Health Centre II in Ibuje Sub-county has also been abandoned after it was submerged by floods last year.
As nine incumbent district chairpersons in Lango Sub-region prepare to exit, their successors will be faced with major challenges, including fighting corruption and child abuse.
On the January 20 polls, voters threw out all eight incumbent chairpersons in Lango Sub-region citing corruption coupled with poor service delivery as some of the factors that informed their choices.
There are nine districts that make up Lango which include Alebtong, Amolatar, Apac, Dokolo, Kole, Lira, Oyam Otuke, and Kwania.
However, it is only in Apac where the incumbent, Mr Bob Okae (Uganda Peoples Congress (UPC), contested for the Kwania North parliamentary seat, which he won.
Of the nine slots, UPC took five seats (Kwania, Amolatar, Apac, Otuke and Alebtong). The National Resistance Movement (NRM) won in Kole, Lira and Oyam while the Forum for Democratic Change (FDC) recaptured Dokolo District from NRM.
UPC’s Geoffrey Ocen is the newly elected Amolatar District chairperson replacing Mr Simon Ongom Cedu (Ind).
In Lira, Mr Alex Oremo Alot (UPC) lost to NRM’s Richard Cox Okello Orik. In Oyam, Mr Benson DilaOyuku of NRM has replaced UPC’s Nelson Adea Akar while Frederick Odongo (Ind) lost the seat to FDC’s James Apili Otto.
In Kole, NRM’s Andrew Awany is the new district boss replacing Ms Betty Akoli Nam whereas Mr Francis Abola (UPC) has replaced NRM’s Bosco Odongo Obote in Otuke.
Critics say the old problems that made the incumbent chairpersons lose still await the newcomers.
Such problems include ending corruption, early marriages, teenage pregnancies and child abuse, which have remained the challenging factors.
For instance, 113 school girls were impregnated in Apac District within three months during the Covid-19 lockdown.
According to quarterly data collected by the Apac District probation department for the months of April, May and June 2020, Chegere Sub-county registered the highest cases of teenage pregnancies followed by Ibuje, Akokoro and Apac sub-counties.
Chegere registered 47 cases, Ibuje 33, Akokoro had 19 cases and Apac Sub-county registered 14 cases.
The data was collected from the health facilities, police stations, offices of the sub-county community development officers, and non-governmental organisations.
Other challenges include insufficient fund allocation to the committees to conduct regular meetings to address accountability issues in the districts, poor quality of agricultural inputs in the open markets, encroachment on road reserves, insufficient funds to district land boards to effectively carry out their mandates and limited funding to the health sector.
Inadequate team spirit to achieve set goals and planned programmes also continues to be a problem.
Mr Tom Superman Opwonya, the executive director of the Apac Anti-Corruption Coalition, said failure to address these issues entails a significant cost to the future.
But how are the newly elected leaders prepared to handle the task?
Amolatar District chair-elect Geoffrey Ocen says his first task will be to restore the relationship between the fishing communities and law enforcers.
During the implementation of the fishing ban which was instituted in March 2019 and partially lifted in August 2020, there were allegations of torture and brutality against civilian population.
“I will ensure that the restriction on fishing is lifted because the lake is a natural resource where people should be allowed to freely carry out fishing for home consumption and sale,” Mr Ocen said on Saturday.
He said government should also provide support to the fishing communities through better markets and subsidies to enable them acquire recommended fishing nets and boats.
Mr Ocen said his administration will also tackle corruption which has affected service delivery.
He added that most government-funded projects have stalled since most of the funds meant for implementation were embezzled through fraudulent award of contracts.
“Almost all the health centres remain closed during weekends and you hardly find any health worker at the facilities yet we have sick people. I am going to handle the problem of health workers absenteeism with an iron fist,” he said.
Mr James Otto Apili, the Dokolo District chair-elect, said his major task will be fighting corruption since the district was ranked one of the corruption hotbeds..
“I want our district service commission to be more transparent in recruitment more than ever before,” Mr Otto said.
He added that his administration will also handle the problem of drug stock-out in government health facilities.
In March 2019, four top officials in Dokolo were arrested by the State House Anti-Corruption Unit team following a special investigation into suspected corruption involving Shs705 million meant for capital development projects.
The suspects included the district engineer, the acting chief finance officer, the district internal auditor and sector accountant works.
