International community must meet obligation to feed refugees — Govt
Mar 04, 2024
According to the minister, the United Nations estimated that Uganda spends between $800m and $1.2m a year on looking after refugees.
Hillary Onek, Minister Relief, Disaster Preparedness and Refugees during the MOU signing. (Photos by Eddie Ssejjoba)
Eddie Ssejjoba
Journalist @New Vision
____________________ Japanese ambassador to Uganda Hidemoto Fukuzawa during the handed over 2,000 metric tonnes of rice worth shillings 7.9 billion
The international community needs to step up funding to meet the increasing demand for refugees, whose numbers are overwhelmingly becoming a burden to the country, the Government has said.
Relief, Disaster Preparedness and Refugees Ministry Hillary Onek says Uganda currently hosts over 1.6 million refugees and many more keep arriving every day, mainly from South Sudan, DR Congo, Somalia, Eritrea, Rwanda, and Burundi.
“Almost every month we get nearly 9,000 refugees and 10,000,” he says. 
According to the minister, the United Nations estimated that Uganda spends between $800m and $1.2m a year on looking after refugees, which according to him is a big burden to a poor country. He has, therefore, asked the international community to step up funding to feed the ‘unfortunate people who are fleeing the countries because of war'.
Onek made the call on February 28, 2024, at a function where he witnessed the signing of a memorandum of understanding between the government of Japan and the World Food Program (WFP).
At the function, Japanese ambassador to Uganda Hidemoto Fukuzawa handed over 2,000 metric tonnes of rice worth shillings 7.9 billion (approx. $2.2m or JPY300m) to WFP deputy country director Marcus Prior. The relief aid will enable WFP to provide hot meals to refugees arriving and those still in transit at the various refugee centres in West Nile and southwestern Uganda.
The minister commended WFP for responding to his request to start purchasing food from local suppliers. He said that last year, WFP bought 75,000 tonnes of maize and beans from local suppliers to feed refugees and distributed cash worth $5m to refugees’ welfare, which he said refugees use to boost the economy through buying food and other services.
Huge contributions
The minister, however, said Uganda is currently hosting the biggest number of refugees in Africa and contributing immensely towards their welfare.
He explained that the Government was spending huge sums of money in providing security to the refugees who he said are occasionally pursued by authorities in their countries because some of them are politically sensitive to the governments that try to follow them into Uganda.
“We have had before cases of abductions in Uganda, but our security forces have managed to stop this,” he said.
In addition, the Government provides land where refugees engage in cultivation and supports them with education and provision of health services. The refugees are also helped to transform and change their mindset since many come with a mentality of violence and fighting, which they tend to continue practicing inside Uganda, but thanks to the Uganda People’s Defence Forces, these incidents have been contained.
The minister said refugees are an international concern and blamed the wars in various countries on external forces mainly from developed countries, which he blamed for stirring conflicts in these countries to take advantage and exploit their minerals.
“These powers are happy to have those countries in turmoil because they will continue to exploit minerals from there, that is the kind of game, which is international," he said.
Onek wants these countries to pick up the obligation to contribute to the welfare of refugees and not leave the burden to a poor country like Uganda.
“We have a good refugee policy and as a country, we tend to sympathize and allow refugees to come into our country but it is costing us a lot, if the international community does not come forward to help us contain this problem, we may revise our policies and become hostile to refugees, which is not going to be helpful to the world,” the minister warned, adding that the war in Ukraine was receiving more financial aid than Africa as a continent.
Onek thanked the government of Japan for being consistent in helping the refugees, saying that when the refugees are hungry, they steal food from gardens, which according to him creates problems with the host communities. The refugee girls, the minister said, resort to sexual immorality when they are hungry, which he said was dehumanising.
Refugees double worldwide
The ambassador raised concern that refugees in the world had more than doubled, now almost reaching 100 million, yet even the food prices had continued to go up due to the ongoing war between Russia and Ukraine.
He pledged that Japan would continue to provide medium- and short-term humanitarian assistance to the WFP and other organisations helping refugees.
Long-standing partner
According to Marcus Prior, Japan has been a longstanding partner of WFP in Uganda and around the world, supporting WFP’s program of work. He said in 2023, the country received over 130,000 new refugees and in January 2024 alone, over 9,000 refugees were registered. He said the contribution came at a time when WFP was financially constrained and providing low food rations to refugees.
“More must be done to build and protect the future of refugees in Uganda and host communities around them. Uganda cannot do it on its own, the rest of the international community must step up and give more support,” he said.
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