The Independent Uganda: You get the Truth we Pay the Price
Kampala, Uganda | THE INDEPENDENT | A cross section of residents in Kasese district has tasked parliament to expedite the enactment of the Uganda Wildlife Bill, which seeks to, among others, provide for compensation for loss occasioned by animals escaping from wildlife protected areas.
The bill tabled by Government Chief Whip Ruth Nankabirwa in July 2017, cites defects in the existing Uganda Wildlife Act which does not provide for compensation for loss of life and property arising from wildlife escaping from protected areas.
But clause 84 of the bill now before parliament provides for compensation where a person is killed, suffers bodily injury or damage to his or her crops or livestock by elephants, lions, leopards, crocodiles, buffaloes, hyenas, hippopotamus, gorillas and chimpanzees. It, however, proposes no compensation where the claimant fails to protect him or herself from wildlife damage.
Kasese District Lands Officer Jimmy Baluku is optimistic that the law will ease the compensation for communities whose properties and lives are lost to animals from the wild. Baluku, a resident of Katadoba cell says that residents in areas neighboring the parks are looking at it as their only source of relief.
Brian Muhindo, a resident of Kanyangeya ward, Nyamwamba Division also argued that farmers continue to lose a lot of money in damages caused by animals which stray into people’s crops.
Bukonzo East MP Harold Tonny Muhindo observed that Kasese district, which lies in the neighborhood of Mt Rwenzori and Queen Elizabeth National Parks, was losing a lot of revenue from farmers whose crops are ravaged by animals from the two protected areas.
Stray wild animals especially elephants from Queen Elizabeth National Park in Rwenzori region, Murchison Falls and Kidepo National parks in the Acholi and Karamoja sub regions have in the past continuously attacked people and destroyed many farmlands leaving the affected communities with no source of livelihood.
******
URN
