UGANDA, Luweero | Real Muloodi News | Everest Muwanguzi, a man who has been impersonating statehouse staff in efforts to fraudulently evict families from a contested piece of land in Luweero, has been arrested.
Muwanguzi attended a land wrangle meeting earlier this month, claiming to be from the State House and siding with one of the parties pushing for mass evictions.
The contested land measures more than one square mile and is occupied by more than 600 sitting tenants at Bubuubi Village in Zirobwe sub-county, Luweero District.
Muwanguzi reportedly had a heap of papers, including headed papers from the President’s office. He was identified by the residents as he quietly attended the meeting convened by Mr Richard Bwabye and the statehouse team at Bubuubi Village.
During his arrest, Muwanguzi tried to defend himself by saying he works for the ‘State House Land Desk’.
The State House team, however, revealed that State House has no land desk but rather a land directorate headed by Ms Gertrude Njuba.
Muwanguzi was arrested and handed over to the Luweero Police.
Ms Mariam Namayanja, the private secretary of land matters, delivered a presidential directive to stop all activities involving the sale and eviction of tenants on the contested piece of land.
“President Museveni is aware of the unfortunate incidents that surround this particular land at Bubuubi. The president has instructed me to deliver the message halting the sale and eviction of tenants on this land until the wrangles among the landlords are resolved. The directive takes immediate effect,” she said.
She also revealed that the land in question attracted different individuals that claim to be rightful owners, which is not the case.
“We already have information that two parties fighting for this land are in courts of law. These are Ms. Catty Nankanja versus Nkuluze (the Kabaka of Buganda) but the good side is that the Kabaka of Buganda through his attorney has already clarified that he is not evicting any of the tenants on his land. Anybody evicting tenants on behalf of the Kabaka is doing it on his own,” she clarified.
One of the residents said he wanted to beat Muwanguzi after finding out that he was impersonating a State House official, yet he was a mere conman.
Ms Namayanja led a team of lawyers from the statehouse Land Directorate currently pitching camp in the districts of Greater Luweero to help resolve some of the land-related disputes which have caused insecurity in Luweero.
The land originally belonged to the late Tito Ssekimaka in 1940, but it is unclear who holds the real land title.
Different people continue to claim and sell portions of the land to several buyers causing mass evictions of the original bibanja holders.
Land has continued to be a contentious issue in many districts in central Uganda, where wealthy people with land titles are allegedly evicting poor tenants from their ancestral land.
Thus, the government is pushing for land reforms, which will stop rampant evictions in the country.
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