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1,500 Rwandese Flee to Uganda

14 August 2013 , By Sadab Kitatta Kaaya & Edward Ssekika, Source: Observer

 

Tension is reigning high along the Uganda -Tanzania border, after hundreds of Rwandan refugees, some armed, crossed into Rakai district.

According to security sources at Mutukula border town, most of the new arrivals escaped into Tanzania at the time of the 1994 Rwanda genocide that claimed some 800,000 people.

 

Reports indicate that the Tanzanian government recently ordered Rwandese illegal immigrants in the north to leave by August 10.

Fearing to be repatriated back to Rwanda, hundreds of refugees started moving into Uganda on August 1. Against the backdrop of Rwanda's troubled history, locals in Rakai have branded the refugees Interahamwe, after the infamous genocidaires who fled that country in 1994.

 

Many have settled on land belonging to Catholic missions in the area, while others have rented lodging facilities at Mutukula and the neighbouring village of Kabonera.

 

A security source in the president's office told The Observer on Monday that about 400 immigrants had been registered.

 

"We have not established how many they [all are], but that number [400] is only for those that entered through the gazetted entry points that we have so far registered," the source said. "But the number is likely to shoot up once the operation starts in Tanzania."

 

Mutukula border point is the only gazetted entry point along the border. But Kakuuto MP Mathias Kasamba said on Monday that several immigrants entered through places like Lukunyu, Minziiro, Kooza and Luzinga in Kyebe sub-county, as well as Kamuli and Ntantamuki, in Kibanda sub-county.

 

According to community leaders we spoke to, some of the immigrants moved in with their guns. Rakai LC5 chairman Robert Benon Mugabi estimates that the number of immigrants now tops 1,500.

 

The registered immigrants are understood to have come with at least

3,716 head of cattle. The police has driven the cattle to a 100-acre holding piece of land at Kasanvu, near Mutukula. Most of those who have registered are women and children. Community leaders said the men were reported to be camping in the bushes with more heads of cattle, and some with guns. The reasons for their staying away were not clear, but police's field force unit commander, Godfrey Maate, said he was not aware of any guns.

 

"So far the information we have is that no one has been sighted with any guns," Maate said. "They crossed with a few belongings but we can't tell where they are keeping them," he said.

 

Predicament:

 

On Monday, Masaka-based Regional Police Commander Maxwell Ogwal rushed to Mutukula to meet the immigrants and chart a way forward. The immigrants, suspicious of Ogwal's intentions, declined to speak to him in a common language.

 

"We have failed to communicate; they are speaking [a tough dialect of] Kinyarwanda. It is not this usual Kinyarwanda that can easily be understood, and they don't speak any other language," Ogwal told The Observer.

 

But away from Ogwal, we have independently established, some of the refugees speak Luganda, Kiswahili and Ruhaya (a dialect similar to Runyankore spoken in parts of northern Tanzania.) The local population is worried about the increased pressures on land, water and other social amenities given the influx of the Rwandan refugees.

 

"My duty is to register them as they come in and put them in one place, the rest is for the Office of the Prime Minister (OPM) to handle," Ogwal added.

 

At Kasanvu, where the police is currently holding them, there are insufficient sanitation facilities. Local leaders such as Kakuuto Sub County Chairman Stephen Ssebunya are fearing disease outbreaks.

 

"We moved them from Mutukula because there are no adequate latrine facilities but even where they have been taken, such facilities are not there. Besides, we have not received the first quarterly release (of funds from the ministry of Finance] with which we would have constructed some sanitation facilities," Ssebunya told The Observer.

"The threat is so big, because the numbers keep growing as more continue to come in."

 

There are also fears of renewed cases of foot and mouth disease in the area. Veterinary officers in Kakuuto sub county have failed to establish whether their cattle were vaccinated before they began their trek into Uganda. Ssebunya told us that they hoped that the ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Animal industry would provide drugs to vaccinate the cattle to mitigate the risk of diseases.

 

Who are they?

 

It is unclear why Tanzania expelled these Rwandans, with Ogwal emphasising that they are not mandated to speak on issues across the border. But according to the operative from the president's office, the Tanzanians are concerned since the predominantly herding community owns huge herds of cattle. There are also concerns that the refugees may have been involved in the 1994 Rwanda genocide, which explains their reluctance to return home, nearly 20 years after the end of the conflict.

 

One woman, identified as Cynthia Kamateneti, told journalists that they were worried they could be killed in Rwanda.

 

"I fled to Tanzania after my family was killed during the 1994 genocide ... I had wanted to go back but I fear I would be killed if I returned to Rwanda; that is why I have come to Uganda which is secure for me," she said.

 

The immigrants are said to have moved in with a lot of money, having sold off some of their cattle, and are reported to have escalated the scramble for land in the area. The Rwandan Ambassador to Uganda, Maj Gen Frank Mugambage, told The Observer that he has been informed by Ugandan authorities of many people crossing into Uganda from Tanzania.

 

"I'm told there are many people, who have crossed; we are yet to know whether they are Rwandese or not. You see, speaking Kinyarwanda doesn't make them Rwandese," he said.

 

Mugambage says the Ugandan government is still screening refugees to know who they are.

 

"Ugandan government is receiving those people and we shall know who exactly who they are. If they are Rwandese, they shall be facilitated back home," he explained.

 

David Apollo Kazungu, the commissioner for Refugees in the office of the prime minister, told The Observer yesterday that the visitors from the south were not refugees but illegal immigrants.

 

"Our immigration department is handling that issue," he said.

 

 

           Thé Mulindwas Communication Group
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