Internally displaced claim reserve
Mar 10, 2009
RESIDENTS of Angisa parish in Magoro sub-country in Katakwi district have appealed to the Government to speed up the process of degazetting part of the Upe-pian wildlife reserve.
By Daniel Edyegu
RESIDENTS of Angisa parish in Magoro sub-country in Katakwi district have appealed to the Government to speed up the process of degazetting part of the Upe-pian wildlife reserve.
This, the former internally displaced persons said, would enable them resettle on their ancestral land without any hindrances.
They told the Uganda Wildlife Authority (UWA) and Katakwi district officials during a consultative meeting in Angisa on Saturday that the Government gazetted their land while they had fled to camps during insurgency caused by the Karimojong.
“When peace returned, the Government encouraged us to resettle in our homes. We were shocked when we were told the area had been made a wildlife reserve,†said 68-year-old Girigorio Akol.
The tourism state minister, Serapio Rukundo, in February 2008 visited the area and directed UWA and the district officials to temporarily resettle the people near the Anti-Stock Theft Unit detachment, as a solution is sought.
A total of 415 families are stranded.
The residents have named the acacia trees, boreholes, graveyards, the smooth black stones and milestones in the area as proof that they once occupied the land.
Echodu Edyau, the warden in charge of the reserve, explained that Parliament gazetted the area into a reserve in 2002 following a study of the then deserted village.
He said UWA allocated the communities 500sqkm of land outside the reserve, but they rejected it, saying it was located in a lowland.
RESIDENTS of Angisa parish in Magoro sub-country in Katakwi district have appealed to the Government to speed up the process of degazetting part of the Upe-pian wildlife reserve.
This, the former internally displaced persons said, would enable them resettle on their ancestral land without any hindrances.
They told the Uganda Wildlife Authority (UWA) and Katakwi district officials during a consultative meeting in Angisa on Saturday that the Government gazetted their land while they had fled to camps during insurgency caused by the Karimojong.
“When peace returned, the Government encouraged us to resettle in our homes. We were shocked when we were told the area had been made a wildlife reserve,†said 68-year-old Girigorio Akol.
The tourism state minister, Serapio Rukundo, in February 2008 visited the area and directed UWA and the district officials to temporarily resettle the people near the Anti-Stock Theft Unit detachment, as a solution is sought.
A total of 415 families are stranded.
The residents have named the acacia trees, boreholes, graveyards, the smooth black stones and milestones in the area as proof that they once occupied the land.
Echodu Edyau, the warden in charge of the reserve, explained that Parliament gazetted the area into a reserve in 2002 following a study of the then deserted village.
He said UWA allocated the communities 500sqkm of land outside the reserve, but they rejected it, saying it was located in a lowland.