28 June 2016

Rugunda criticises OPM officials over Sango Bay refugees

Prime Minister Ruhakana Rugunda . FILE PHOTO  





Prime Minister Ruhakana Rugunda has criticised officials in the Disaster Preparedness docket for relocating refugees from Sango Bay Resettlement Camp in Rakai District to Kyegegwa District without informing local leaders.






Dr Rugunda, who rushed to Kyegegwa District at the weekend to defuse disagreements between the local community and the refugees, who started arriving in the area last Friday, said he was astonished to learn that the local community and local leaders were not aware of the government’s plan to resettle the refugees in their area.






“I was not aware that these (refugees) were being transferred to this area and I wish to apologise on behalf of the government for carrying out such an exercise without informing the local leaders and the community of Kyegegwa,” he said.






He added: “The officials in OPM made a mistake to carry out this exercise without informing the political leaders at the centre and in the district. ”
The Prime Minister’s intervention followed reports that residents and local leaders in Kyaka I and Kyaka II camps, where government plans to resettle the refugees, had resisted the move, saying the same land is used by the indigenous people in the area.






Last Friday, government started relocating more than 5,000 refugees from Sango Bay Resettlement Camp to Kyegegwa in an exercise expected to take between five to 10 days. The refugees were expelled from Tanzania in 2013 over illegal entry.






The Uganda government had temporarily resettled them at Sango Bay.
Kyegegwa District chairperson Rusoke Byamukama said they were shocked to find a “crowd of people” pitching camp at Kazinga Health Centre III in Rwentuha Sub- county last Friday yet there was no one to give explanation for their existence in the area .






“We are leaders responsible for this area, but we were left out about the activities being carried out by government,” he said
But Mr Martin Owori , the commissioner of disaster preparedness in the Office of the Prime Minister, refuted claims that local leaders were not aware about their plan to relocate the refugees .






“It is not true that we did not inform the leaders here. We held a meeting with previous Kyegegwa District local council executive early this year and drafted the guidelines for this activity, but we assumed that this information will be passed on to the new leaders, which wasn’t the case. We stand to be pardoned for this mistake,” he said.






Dr Rugunda said the land where the refugees are to be resettled is public land without any encumbrances.
However, Mr Rusoke said many locals had bought plots of the land without knowing that it was public land .






Mr Charles Bafashaki, the head of refugee settlement in the Office of the Prime Minister, said they were forced to relocate the refugees from Sango Bay to Kyegegwa due to the harsh conditions they were going through there.








The prime minister instituted a 11- member committee comprising officials from OPM, local leaders and representative from the affected community to help sensitise residents about government’s programme and ensure that the refugees are resettled peacefully within a period of three months.






editorial @ug.nationmedia.com






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