Ministers knock heads over land wrangles in Kayunga

Ms Namuganza who last Thursday during a meeting with affected residents at Nkokonjeru Trading Centre, Kitimbwa Sub-county, said she had ignored warnings by Ms Nantaba not to step her foot in Kayunga District to solve the land dispute, expressed disappointment that her predecessor had tried to block her from visiting the district.

“I cannot listen to people who just politick on such sensitive issues like land, which can lead to bloodshed. There are politicians in this area, who pretend to be fighting for you where as they are just using land issues to get votes,” Ms Namuganza said amid ululations from the locals.

Ms Nantaba, who is also the Kayunga District Woman MP won hearts of many residents in the district as she was perceived as a fighter against land grabbers while still Lands state minister.

However, her efforts have not yielded any fruit since she has never solved any land dispute to its logical conclusion in the district.
Instead, she has been dragged to court over criminal land trespass and destruction of people’s property.

The current land dispute in question involves more than 20,000 residents from 16 villages, whose land was allegedly illegally sold by Kayunga District Land Board in 2014 to Kayunga Sugar Works Ltd, a subsidiary of Madhvani Group of Companies. Madhvani bought the land at unspecified amount of money to grow sugar cane.

However, on learning about the “illegal” land transaction, the then LC5 chairman, Mr Stephen Dagada, suspended members of the board and refunded the Shs200m, partial payment that had been made by Madhvani.

According to the Bbaale County MP, Mr George Kumama, despite the refund of the money and termination of the land transaction, the land title that had been given to Madhvani by the Lands ministry was not cancelled, which meant the buyer still owned the land and can evict the tenants at will.

This prompted Mr Kumama to petition the Speaker of Parliament Rebecca Kadaga.

An official from Kayunga Sugar Works who preferred anonymity said, they had interest in the land but after learning that it had many sitting tenants, they abandoned it.

However, Ms Nantaba, said she was opposed to the minister’s intervention in the dispute, since she had already solved it. “The minister is now teaming up with land grabbers so that the land is taken away from the residents,” Ms Nantaba, who did not attend the meeting said.

The contested land also houses Bulawula Government Prison, Nkokonjeru Health Centre II and four public primary schools.

Ms Nantaba, was accused of bribing residents with Shs50,000 to boycott the minister’s meeting, an allegation she denied.
Ms Namuganza who promised to process customary certificates of land ownership and also buy land for some of the affected residents asked locals not to vote back into offices politicians who don’t solve their problems .