Kalangala landowners await justice, compensation from Bidco
Sauda Kyensi recounts how the family lost its land to the oil palm project. PHOTO | DICTA ASIIMWE
What you need to know:
Bidco is under pressure from environmentalists over its failure to create buffer zones to protect Lake Victoria from the erosion, fertilisers and pesticides associated with planting and maintenance of high yielding oil palm trees.
Sauda Kyensi, 36, lives alone in a dilapidated wooden hut at Kasenyi landing site.
In 2011, Ms Kyensi, was evicted from her four-acre piece of land, on which she grew coffee, bananas and avocado, to pave the way for an oil palm plantation.
Ms Kyensi is one of the many people counting their losses in Kalangala, one of the Lake Victoria island districts, as they await justice from the courts of law or compensation for the land they lost in 2011.
At the time the eviction, Ms Kyensi lived with a husband and their children, but the family disintegrated immediately afterwards. The husband left Kalangala and has never returned, while the children also scattered. Â
In the court case filed in March 2015, Ms Kyensi is not a plaintiff, but a member of Bugala Farmers Association (BFA), which was organised by the National Association of Professional Environmentalists (NAPE) and Friends of the Earth, an international NGO involved in protecting the environment to push for the rights of the evicted farmers and landowners.
NAPE executive director Frank Muramuzi said the NGOs want the marginalised farmers compensated. Involvement of the NGOs seems to be giving hope to some of the evictees such as Mariam Nakaketo, whose family owned 25 acres of land, much of which was taken to pave way for the establishment of the 10,000 acre palm oil plantation.
Unlike most of the displaced BFA members who now live at Bumangi Catholic Mission on Bugala Island, Ms Nakaketo lives on a small sandy piece of land sandwiched between Lake Victoria and a large Bidco Africa plantation. Bidco had been pushing to get her removed from this sandy piece of land, but in October 2015, the Masaka court stopped evictions by Bidco and its partners.
Bidco is under pressure from environmentalists over its failure to create buffer zones to protect Lake Victoria from the erosion, fertilisers and pesticides associated with planting and maintenance of high yielding oil palm trees.
Bidco would rather plant this 200-metre stretch with tree cover, similar to the rain forests that used to occupy most of Bugala Island, but the company is abiding by the court order.
Ms Nakaketo is happy with her small victory, although this piece of land hardly produces anything. Still, she says it is a sign that she can reclaim her land. Ironically, she survives by working for the crop responsible for her eviction, as she is hired as farm hand by oil palm plantation owners.
