Benet Community Wants Museveni to Address Permanent Resettlement

The Benet Community in Bukwo, Kween and Kapchorwa Districts want President Yoweri Kaguta Museveni’s Sebei tour to address the issue of permanent resettlement.

The President is expected to visit the Sebei sub-region according to Hope Atuhaire, the Resident district commissioner (RDC) Kween.

The community claims that every presidential visit to Sebei has never had any impact in regard to the crisis of their resettlement. They note that the President's directives only excite the crowd but no action is taken. 

Mande David the coordinator of the Benet lobby group explains that the temporal resettlement by the Benet community has led to continuous tension between the community and Uganda Wild Life Authority-UWA rangers who are accused of brutality, alleged killings and crop destruction.

“If President Museveni loves Sebei, where citizens who cannot predict their fate and destiny, then it means we are not Ugandans and this will be the right time for him to tell us where we belong," Mande said. 

Denis Chelangat Kamakate, the former Chairperson of Benet sub-county said that the government should have an immediate remedy to the outcry of the vulnerable community.   He noted that the same community voted for President Museveni 100% during the previous elections hoping that their demands would be addressed. 

“The president is a Ugandan like us, let him help the people to have their permanent residence so that we can receive social services," says Kamakete.

Geoffrey Chelogoi, the LCV Chairperson of Kween, hopes that the leaders who shall present Sebei issues to the President will do it with emphasis. “I am an independent candidate and with the bureaucracy of the arrangement, I may not be in a better place for the chances are minimal, however, if given, surely I will present the matter,” says Chelogoi.

In 2008, the government evicted 178 Indigenous Benet families from Mount Elgon National Park in the districts of Bukwo and Kween rendering them homeless.   The government had earlier in 1993 evicted hundreds of other Benets commonly known as the Ndorobos from the forest.   

Thirteen years after the evictions, the Benet still live in temporary resettlement camps where they are not permitted to build permanent structures.

They are living in small mud and wattle huts, with no access to electricity and safe drinking water.  The insecurity of land tenure impacts their livelihood, including crop and animal farming but has also undermined the provision of social services like education, infrastructure, health, and other social services to the internally displaced communities of Sebei.     

In 2004, the Uganda Land Alliance-ULA filed a legal suit against Uganda Wildlife Authority-UWAin the High Court on behalf of the Benet community, for enforcement of their right to use their forest land and on 27 October 2005, a judgment commonly referred to as the “Consent Judgment” was delivered which was settled and agreed to by the affected Benet community, the UWA, and the Attorney General of Uganda.

The court recognized the Benet as the historical and indigenous inhabitants of the forest that the government had classified a national park in 1993, underlining the need to “redress the imbalance” facing the Benet. 

Some of the settlements where the Benets are living include Kapsegek, Teryet who were evicted in 1993, and the Yatui, Lwanda resettlement camps among others.