"Over 1,000 evicted in Hoima over oil"

Over 1,000 people are homeless after they were evicted from their customary land in...Hoima district, to pave way for the construction of an oil waste treatment facility. Some of the evicted people who comprise of over 100 families are currently camped on a piece of land that was provided to them by good samaritans. According to Nelson Atich the parish chairperson for Katanga, on August 25, the Police armed with rifles, batons and, teargas canisters, demolished houses that had been erected on a 700 hectare piece of land leaving the people homeless...The Residential District Commissioner (RDC) Godfrey Nyakahuma condemned the eviction of the locals saying the law was not followed. “We don’t support this eviction because the law was not followed, they should have compensated or resettled these people before evicting them. And to make matters worse no court order was given prior to their eviction. Land owners should learn to respect squatters,” said Nyakahuma. “We are badly off, our children are suffering from constant Malaria and cough, they cannot access health services like immunization,” said one of the affected people. Charles Karal another affected person said; “we are drinking water from open water ponds, we need safe water and latrine coverage, we only have three latrines”. We want to ensure that these people attain justice in courts of law so that they live a decent life, either by re-accessing their former homeland or attaining fair compensation,” said Fredrick Kawooya the policy manager Action Aid.