Government orders Jinja Hospital, UMSC to share contested land
Muslims using the wall fence to access the cemetery in Jinja City on October 29, 2024. PHOTO/TAUSI NAKATO
What you need to know:
- Last week, the UMSC petitioned Ms Nabakooba in their latest attempt to regain the land in a letter dated October 23, 2024.
Government has ordered Jinja Regional Referral Hospital (JRHH) and the Uganda Muslim Supreme Council (UMSC) to share the contested 4.2 acres of land on Clive Road West and Baxi Road in Jinja City.
The decision was reached during a closed-door meeting convened for both parties by the Minister for Lands, Housing and Urban Development, Ms Judith Nabakooba, which ended on Monday night, October 29 at Jinja City Chambers.
After conducting a locus visit to the contested land with her Ministry of Health counterpart, Ms Jane Ruth Aceng, Ms Nabakooba said it was resolved that JRRH gives half an acre to UMSC and uses the remainder to set up Heart and Cancer Institutes and Blood Bank for Busoga Sub-region.
“Jinja Muslim Supreme should be given half an acre of the land owned by JRRH to create passage to the cemetery and small parking for people who will be going for burial,” Ms Nabakooba said, advising the latter JRRH to pass a no objection to that decision.
Last week, the UMSC petitioned Ms Nabakooba in their latest attempt to regain the land in a letter dated October 23, 2024.
The latest petition by the UMSC comes after JRRH contracted the Engineering Brigade of the Uganda People’s Defence Forces (UPDF) to erect a wall fence on the contested land as a buffer.
In doing so, the Muslim community in Jinja City was denied access to a cemetery where they have been burying their loved ones for the past 92 years.
Ms Nabakooba said a surveyor and physical planner will survey, offer guidance on the proper planning of the land, and she further advised that all litigation procedures be put aside “in the spirit of brotherhood”.
“In the spirit of team work and brotherhood, we have agreed not to go into legalities or put them aside, and we look at co-existence, meaning issues of compensation will not be there,” Ms Nabakooba said.
Ms Nabakooba further stated that she will write to President Museveni to allocate Shs400m to buy 10 acres of land for the expansion of a cemetery because the current one is full with no land for expansion.
“If there is no government land in Jinja which is not encumbered, we might allocate that piece of land to them,” said Ms Nabakooba.
Ms Aceng said the resolutions are not overturning any Court decisions, but to address access to the cemetery that belongs to UMSC and the parking space which they requested for in writing.
“The land belongs to JRRH-Uganda Land Commission (ULC); so, we have not overturned any Court decision,” Dr Aceng said, adding that the half acre is in a triangular area on Clive Road West and Baxi road.
“The implementation of an order of curving off half an acre starts immediately on Tuesday (today). We are not going to ask for compensation for half an acre because we are giving it out for road access and parking,” explained Dr Aceng.
The construction of a Blood Bank, Cancer and Heart Institutes, Dr Aceng stated, will be done as soon as resources have been acquired and once Cabinet discusses and approves.
The Deputy Mufti, Sheikh Muhammad Ali Waiswa, asked the Muslim community to receive the news with acceptance, saying: “We have reached an amicable solution to access the cemetery and thank the Ministers for Lands and Health.”
After JRRH fenced off the land with the help of the Engineering Brigade of the Uganda People’s Defence Force (UPDF), the Muslim community has been scaling the perimeter wall with bodies of their loved ones to access the cemetery.
Mr Habib Muhammad, a resident who lost his auntie last week in Mombasa, said the family struggled to bury her after failing to access the cemetery and had to improvise by using temporary ladders to deliver her body to the burial site.
Mr Ashraf Mohammed, another resident, said at times, bodies fall from their Jeneza (Swahili word for coffin) as they are being scaled up the fence, a situation the UMSC described in their petition to Ms Nabakooba last week as “humiliating, unrealistic, dehumanising and unacceptable in society”.
JRRH Director, Dr Alfred Yayi, earlier told Daily Monitor in a separate interview that UMSC was advised to formally request for access to the cemetery, but had not made such a request.
“The UMSC was advised to write to the user of the land (Jinja Hospital), requesting for access to their cemetery, but they haven’t written to us yet.
“Jinja Hospital has since contracted the UPDF Engineering Brigade to erect a perimeter wall at Shs300m as a security measure to ward off encroachers on the land,” said Dr Yayi.
