"Oxfam Urges Fair Compensation for Ugandan Oil-Pipeline Land"

Uganda should fairly compensate landowners affected by a pipeline that will transport oil to an Indian Ocean port after accusations that some people reimbursed for earlier public projects were left worse-off, Oxfam International said. [It] said it’s concerned that “community participation, livelihoods and land rights could be overlooked in a quest to meet the schedule for land acquisition” for the 1,445-kilometer (898-mile) conduit that will link Uganda’s western oilfields with Tanga in Tanzania. Total SA, China’s Cnooc and London-based Tullow Oil Plc are developing Uganda’s estimated 6.5 billion barrels of oil resources, with the planned pipeline crossing eight districts and 296 kilometers in the country.

“Oxfam is interested in seeing that extractives projects benefit host communities and that governments and citizens in resource-rich countries get a fair share of their natural resource wealth,” Gerald Byarugaba, extractive industries coordinator at the charity’s Ugandan office said. “Available information points to some irregularities that left some project-affected persons worse-off,” he said, referring to earlier government projects, without identifying them. [also refers to Gulf Interstate Engineering]