By Leonard Kamugisha Akida,
GOMBA
President Museveni has directed Landlords to stop with immediate effect illegal evictions of Bibanja holders.
The president was speaking at the commentation of 35th Heroes Day celebration at Mpenja CoU Primary School playgrounds in Gomba district on Sunday (June 9) when he asked landlords charging excessive nominal rent fees (obusuulu) to return it to bibanja holders immediately lest they risk being arrested.
“The landlords who have been charging more than the agreed busuulu fees by the district must return it back, and if they try to evict our people, we shall arrest them. You must pay back all the money you have taken from these people and the evictions are illegal,” Museveni said.
The President said the issue of the Landlords and bibanja holders was resolved in the Constituent Assembly (CA) and also in the Land Act of 1998.
“We said a landlord has no power to evict a kibanja person especially the one who was on that plot of land (Kibanja) by 1983. The only thing was to provide some nominal rent (busuulu) and that was to be fixed by the district land boards. The landlords must accept what we agreed in 1995 because Idi Amin had actually abolished mailo land but we restored ownership in order to allow a win-win situation, but these landlords don’t listen to the NRM and they think it’s a joke,” he said.
The directive followed claims by the Gomba district Chairman LC5, Geoffrey Kiviiri on the increasing land wrangles in the district caused by excess nominal feel charged by the landlords.
According to Kiviiri, the approved nominal fees paid to the landlords is Shs10,000 per year but landlords have refused such payments leading to the increasing land wrangles in the area.
Responding to these claims, the president said new policies will be put in place to safeguard this.
“Maybe what we have to resolve in the NRM parliamentary caucus is to provide that if the landlords don’t accept the rent fees, it (rent) should be taken and kept at the sub county. All this suffering is not following what was put in the law,” H.E Museveni directed.
He further asked the Resident District Commissioner-RDC for Gomba, Harriet Nakamya to record all those under threat of eviction due to the nominal fees and see how to resolve the matter with their landlords.
During the celebration, the Minister for Lands, Housing and Urban Development, Hon. Judith Nabakooba gave out land titles to 446 people of Kanoni, Gomba, courtesy of the government through the Land Fund.
Although the government is priding in a secure Uganda, many veterans argue that the government has abandoned and forgotten them for many times. However, the President promised to meet the executive of the veterans to discuss several issues. He also asked them to embrace government wealth creation programs such as the Parish Development Model to fight poverty and improve on their livelihoods.
“Now you the veterans, when I launched Operation Wealth Creation, I told Gen. Saleh to first give coffee seedlings or other seedlings to the families of the veterans and that is why we started in the Luwero area,” Museveni said.
During the celebration, 49 distinguished persons were awarded medals for their exceptional contribution towards the socio-economic transformation of the country.
Among the awardees was Sheikh Mohammed Bin Maktoum Bin Jumah Al Maktoum from the United Arab Emirates (UAE) who received a distinguished Order of the Crested Crane 1st Class Medal. He is a businessman and a member of the Dubai Royal family.
