Balaalo return to haunt north 4 years after Museveni order

The number of Balaalo (herdsmen) now spread across Acholi Sub-region has reportedly increased since 2017 amid growing concerns over land rights and conflict.

 On October 24, 2017, President Museveni directed the army and the Agriculture ministry to evict the Balaalo pastoralists from northern Uganda.

 The directive was in reaction to claims from the leadership across the sub-region that the pastoralists’ population had swollen and was hampering farming as their animals strayed into farmlands and destroyed crops.

 Between September 2015 and August 2016, the local leaders from Gulu, Amuru, and Nwoya districts issued an ultimatum ordering the pastoralists to evacuate since some had guns and were threatening the lives of local farmers.

 The President then ordered the eviction of all the Balaalo pastoralists on unfenced land and with animals straying onto people’s farm lands. 

 Although the directive was to stay in force without a time limit, Saturday Monitor has established that four years later, the number of pastoralists and the population of their animals across the sub-region has more than tripled.

 The area resident district commissioners say in 2017, at the time President Museveni gave the directive, Lamwo District had less than 400 herdsmen while Amuru had at most 250 of them. 
But Lamwo now has the highest influx of pastoralists, standing at more than 1,500 with their head of cattle estimated at 35,000, with both Amuru and Kitgum districts hosting significant numbers. 

 Just three weeks ago, the local authorities of Labongo-Akwang Sub-county in Kitgum District, forced out into neighbouring Lamwo District, three separate groups of pastoralists with their cattle.

 An ultimatum issued by the sub-county leaders and district security officials to the pastoralists to vacate the sub-county by October 1 had expired, forcing the leaders to swing into action.
 The pastoralists had settled in Pinymunu Village in Pajimo Parish after their arrival with 35 head of cattle for fattening from Ngora District in Teso on September 12.

 The Labongo-Akwang Sub-county chairperson, Mr Mark Lubangakene, said the pastoralists had become defiant.
 “The pastoralists were first issued with animal travel permits from the district veterinary officer before being allowed to proceed to Lamwo District via Kitgum-Palabek road,” he said.

 President Museveni’s directive to evict all Balaalo herdsmen from Acholi Sub-region in October 2017, was extended to January 2018 by the Agriculture ministry over lack of animal vaccines. 

Then Agriculture, Animal Industry and Fisheries minister, Mr Vincent Ssempijja, said the ministry needed more time to procure vaccines to vaccinate all the animals before transporting them back to the areas they came from to guard against an outbreak of foot and mouth disease then prevalent in several parts of the country.
 
A few months later in 2018, Mr Ssempijja, while addressing district leaders, UPDF generals and the pastoralists in Gulu, warned that nomadism in Uganda must stop since it was compromising breeding and quality of animals for commercial purposes. 

“The last warning to pastoralists, nomadism must stop. If you want animal husbandry, follow modern and up-to-date procedures. Buy land and plan well. You don’t need to roam the whole country looking for pasture,” Mr Ssempijja warned. 
But this newspaper established that only a small fraction of the herdsmen were evicted from the region while the majority stayed put. 

In 2020, for example, the residents who in the past surrendered their land to the government for the construction of Amuru sugar factory, raised the red flag about the takeover of the project site by herdsmen and thousands of their cattle. 
The local authorities claimed that more than 7,000 head of cattle were grazing in the villages of Tee-okutu, Bombay, Orego in Lakang and Kololo parishes as well as Orego Village in Pailyec Parish. 

Mr Michael Ochora, the Orego Village chairperson, said to date, several camps have been created by the herdsmen who keep penetrating the area from Pakwach in West Nile. 

“We marched and petitioned the RDC. We had given them two weeks to chase away the herdsmen because of the destruction their animals were causing to the crop plantations neighbouring the project area but up to now, nothing has changed,” Mr Ochora said. 

In a letter, a copy of which Saturday Monitor has seen, the residents asked the RDC to explain why the land had become a grazing area yet the government took it for sugarcane growing. 
Earlier, the Amuru District leadership had written to the Ministry of Lands, demanding an explanation about the presence of pastoralists on the land and when the Madhvani Sugar project would start.

 
Security concerns
But complaints over land-related conflicts sparked off by the presence of the pastoralists have resurfaced to haunt the region. 

Unlike in the past, Mr James Nabinson Kidega, the Lamwo RDC, said the herdsmen have been unscrupulously buying hundreds of acres of land in the district to graze animals and many complaints have been registered by the security agencies. 

“Most of these herdsmen came between 2020 and 2021 when people were busy with politics and the 2021 General Election and few people paid attention to them while they brought in their cattle. As we speak, they have over 30,000 head of cattle in the district,” Mr Kidega said. 

He said more than 90 percent of cases of land conflict in the district are linked to sales and lease of land to the Balaalo. 
“Besides fights among families over the sale of land to the herdsmen, many communally-owned grazing lands are being sold off forcefully by certain individuals to the Balaalo, yet these land don’t belong to anybody but the community, especially those reserved for grazing cattle communally,” Mr Kidega said. 

He added: “We have also been able to discover that some of these people are Rwandan nationals considering documents we found with them. This made us decide that anybody who sold land to them (Balaalo) must refund their money and the herdsmen leave the district immediately.” 
Last week, the Chua County West MP, Mr Philip Okin Ojara, threatened to mobilise his constituents to evict the Balaalo should they fail to vacate the area by the start of the new month.  

But the security agencies have warned him against inciting the locals and instead advised him to use dialogue to see their peaceful eviction.
 Mr Geoffrey Oceng Osborn, the RDC of Amuru, said: “These people are smart, they drive the cows through Lira, Omoro, Pader, and Kitgum districts before they reach Amuru District. They don’t move straight to avoid security checkpoints.” 
He said in Amuru, there are up to 150 land conflict cases registered since January, stemming from land hired out or sold to the herdsmen to graze cattle.
 “All these cases originate from the land that Balaalo have bought or hired and are grazing their cattle on. To make matter worse, the blocks of land are not fenced as directed by the President,” he said.

 Mr Oceng says the cattle were also destroying crops but that whenever the locals tried to seek compensation from the herdsmen, they have turned violent. 
Besides wrangling over land, Mr Oceng says the presence of herdsmen in the district has turned into a source of insecurity. 
“They don’t have identification cards, we don’t know if they are nationals from other countries because almost all of them can’t identify themselves every time we arrest them. This is making us question how they got to buy the land even when their origin is not clear.” 

In Amuru District, the areas occupied by the herdsmen include Okidi, Atiak, Palukere, in Atiak Sub-county, while Bombay, Kololo, Bana, among other areas in Opara Sub-county are also occupied by the herdsmen. 
According to the Atiak Sub-county chairperson, Mr Samuel Akera, there are more than 20,000 cattle belonging to Balaalo in Okidi parish. He said the whole Atiak Sub-county is crowded by Balaalo stretching to Aswa River. 
“As of now, we don’t have clear statistics of the actual number of Balaalo in the district and because there are over 20,000 cattle belonging to them in Okidi Parish alone, it means a lot is out there,” Mr Akera said. 

“We had given the herdsmen 30 days to voluntarily register and provide details on how they acquired the land before we forcefully sent them away. As I speak now, the period has expired and they have not responded,” Mr Okidi added. 
“As a council, we have resolved to begin eviction and we shall have a meeting with the security officials to decide when the eviction will start.”  
Kitgum RDC William Komakech says all the herdsmen were evicted from the district in 2018 and any in the district was operating illegally. 

“Following the directive of the President in 2018, we evicted all Balaalo but following the community outcry, we are investigating those said to be around to be evicted immediately since they did not inform the authorities while entering the district. 
In Gulu, Mr Christopher Opiyo, the district chairperson, told Saturday Monitor that the district has confirmed reports of presence of the herdsmen in several villages in Palaro, Cwero, Awac sub-counties and that plans were underway to evict them. 

“We cannot give them any more time. The President gave it long ago and he has never come out to say the Balaalo should be allowed to settle and so as district leaders, we shall start eviction of Balaalo anytime,” Mr Opiyo said. 
“There are cases of land conflicts everywhere these Balaalo have hired land to graze their cattle or bought land to graze their cattle. It is not that we don’t want them to own land here, but they should follow the right channels and must fence off their land before they bring any cattle.”  

In Uganda, cattle are the most important source of meat and milk, with the country producing more than 200 metric tonnes of beef and more than 1.5 billion litres of milk per year (UBOS, 2015).
 More than a quarter of the total Uganda population partly or fully depends on cattle for their livelihoods.
With the presence of vast and largely empty land with favourable pasture for livestock production in the Acholi region, the Balaalo herdsmen since 2013 have been sneaking into the region to graze their cows. 

 Security sources say the majority of the pastoralists claim to be from Kyankwanzi, Kiryandongo, Luweero and Bushenyi, who either hire or buy land from the landowners while others are said to always intruded into open community owned land.
 Meanwhile, in Amuru District, the herdsmen often bring down boundary markers to intrude and settle on any open land.

Pressure group

Reno Joseph Opiyo heads a local pressure group campaigning against the influx and fresh entry of herdsmen, saying so far 14 trucks loaded with cattle and herdsmen have been intercepted in Kitgum and Lamwo districts and forced to retreat. 
“On October 30, we held a security meeting in which the top security leadership of Lamwo attended and we gave the herdsmen 14 days to register. By next week when the deadline ends, those who decline to register will be chased back,” he said. 
“We are doing our best to curtail the influx of the herdsmen and safeguard the land rights of our people and also the presidential directive that forced their eviction four years ago is still in force, he added. 
He said the herdsmen had pitched camp in Namokora, and Orom sub-counties in Kitgum District.

 He said in Lamwo District, the herdsmen had camped at Anaka parish, in the villages of Anaka trading centre and Ajawoogala, and Gem in Palabek-Gem Sub-county, including at Padwat and Paracele parishes in the new Nyimur Sub-county.
 He said the herdsmen camp in groups that hold at least 2,000 cattle.
 He said last week alone, they intercepted four trucks at Palabek-Ogili after the authorities in Amuru District disowned the herdsmen.

 “They don’t report to the leadership, people just wake up and find them there. As we speak, we have over 34,000 head of cattle belonging to the Balaalo,” he said.
 He added:  “They don’t have documents but they speak Kinyarwanda, so we don’t know whether they are residents or dissidents from hostile states.” 

  The Aswa River Region police spokesperson said the number of cases of stolen cattle in Acholi Sub-region between October and December 2019, doubled to nearly 460 from 213 cases registered between April and September 2019. 
 The thieves are said to exploit the weak coordination between security and the veterinary department, who are mandated to monitor the movement of animals in every district.
 On August 13, 2020, five herdsmen identified as Fred Kiviri, Livingstone Talemwa, Robert Byaruhanga, Samuel Kasasira, and Wilson Kiiza, were charged at Gulu Grade I Magistrate’s Court with stealing livestock from a farm in Paicho Sub-county, Gulu District.

 On December 18 last year, the Gulu Magistrates’ Court presided over by Mr Francis Matenga heard that Byaruhanga and his co-accused broke into Homa Farm on April 7, 2020, and stole 25 head of cattle valued at Shs70m.
 In his ruling, Mr Matenga sentenced the five suspects to five years in prison and ordered them to jointly pay Onono Shs80m for the lost animals. 

  Jerome Angena, a senior state prosecutor, asked the court to slap a maximum sentence on the five suspects, whom he said several police records showed were operating a cartel that stole animals from the Acholi region and sold them in Kampala.
 On October 18, the Acholi Paramount Chief David Onen Acana II told Local Government minister Raphael Magyezi that the cultural institution was moving towards formulating by-laws and ordinances to curb unnecessary sale of land to pastoralists in the region.

 He said the rampant sales and lease of land to the pastoralists had resulted in widespread wrangles over land ownership with some deaths recorded.
 “Because it is our desire to have a healthy and prosperous community with a self-reliant population. Around December, we shall all assemble here to come up with our position as Acholi and present to the government,” Rwot Achana added.
 The Acholi Cultural Institution Prime Minister, Mr Ambrose Olaa, said the cultural institution has resolved to come up with a by-law to prohibit and control sales of land. 
 The institution said land in Acholi is still clustered into farmland, communal grazing land and communal hunting grounds which are not owned by individuals and cannot be sold out by any individual.

 Mr Olaa said the fresh influx of the Balaalo is distorting the Acholi systems on food production and security with widespread land wrangles it is struggling to mediate.
 “Usually the cattle of the Balaalo move freely and are affecting our production of crops. Besides, young people in communities who do not know what to do with money are selling out land carelessly,” Mr Olaa said.

 He gave an example of a family in Paluda Sub-county in Lamwo District where a man sold to the herdsmen 1,200 acres of land at only Shs20 million.
 “That was very unfortunate, even worse, the same land was communally owned. We have convinced them to return the money and recover the land since the deal was unscrupulous,” he said.

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