Namuganza clarifies on encroached Museveni land

LAND   

KAMPALA - State Minister for Lands, Persis Namuganza has clarified on the alleged fraudulently acquired land belonging to President Yoweri Museveni in Gomba district.

Namuganza while addressing the press at her office in Kampala on Tuesday, said that two titles were forged in 2014 with help of Modpher Kajumbula the then commissioner for surveys and mapping in the lands ministry.

She said that with the help of commissioner Kajumbula, Peter Sseggane and Jimmy Ssuuna interchanged the president's block number from 396 to 369. 

The revelation comes after the arrest of Seggane and Ssuuna by the head of the State House Anti-Corruption Unit, Lt Col Edith Nakalema on charges of fraudulently acquiring land titles from private land of the president.  

The land is located at Katwe-Kambwa in Kabulassoke sub-county in Gomba district.

Namuganza said Ssuuna and Sseggane forged the titles at a time when the lands ministry had no control system for tracking land titles.

"Under the new system known as the land information system, we managed to detect the forged titles on the president's land. People used to alternate the block and plot numbers and when the ministry tried to carry out real survey and mapping, we found that it's the same piece of land. So, this new system has helped us, we have managed to detect forged titles." Namuganza said.

Namuganza clarified that the new information system which was implemented in Mpigi district in 2019, has helped them detect the forged titles on president's land. 

"Under the new system, interchanging or alternating of block numbers is impossible which was a case in the old system," Namuganza added.

She explained that so many other titles were created and are overlapping on the same block and same plots.

"The ministry has already started auditing out those titles after being detected under the new system so that latest titles be cancelled and maintain the ones in the system before," she revealed.

BACKGROUND

According to available information, President Museveni applied for a leasehold on public land (formerly Crown Land), which is under the control of the Uganda Land Commission. 

Upon receipt of his application, according to a statement read by Dorcas W. Okalany, the permanent secretary of the lands ministry, the controlling authority, carried out a due process. On February 1, 1997, the land commission issued Museveni with a 44-year leasehold title on Block 369, Plot 4.

Okalany, however, said in 2014, Sseggane and Ssuuna approached Kabulassoke Area Land Committee and showed them a deed plan, which she said is alleged to have been signed by the then commissioner of surveys and mapping, Modhfer Kajumbula Nsubuga, for allocation of land.

Okalany said in 2020 when the original proprietor (Museveni) of the land wanted to further develop his land, he found out that his land had three overlapping titles on Block 369, plots 7, 8 and 9.