Locals in Busia, Kuluba Sub County, Koboko District have asked the government to help them resettle almost four months after they were evicted following a land dispute involving Uganda and South Sudan.
On April 17th, 2026, more than 100 families in the four villages of Namiliki, Tendele, Kijari and Busia were subjected to forceful eviction by a group of over 300 people armed with pangas, clubs, bows and arrows.
The group was reportedly from South Sudan and claimed to be owners of the disputed land. They crossed River Kaya, which separates Uganda from South Sudan in Koboko, and attacked the locals in this area, forcing them to flee.
Mohamad Sika Jaberi one of the affected Ugandans who has lived on the contested land in Busia for the last 23 years, is asking the government to intervene and possibly provide compensation.
Jaberi explained that they started facing aggression from the land grabbers in 2021, but the situation worsened on April 17th when the people from the Nyamburi clan invaded and evicted them forcefully.
Badru Okuma, another victim, told Uganda Radio Network that he and his family are now stranded and starving after losing all their belongings to the land grabbers.
Similarly, Habib Sunday, a Kakwa from Kuluba Sub County, explained that the violent actions against them were triggered by some powerful individuals in South Sudan demanding the land in question.
Adinan Indana from Nyori clan in Kuluba Sub-county said that, after the violent action of the Nyamburi people, a meeting was convened, but the elders in the area who are landlords were denied opportunity to explain themselves on the history of the land in question.
Richard Andama, the Executive Director West Nile Compensation Advocacy Network-WE-CAN, an umbrella organization advocating for and seeking justice for the victims, said they have written a demand letter to the Minister for the Presidency and the Minister of Lands seeking compensation for the affected families and individuals in the Koboko land evictions.
According to Andama, failure to respond to the aid of the affected persons will force them to engage legal means to seek justice for the affected families.
However, Ashraf Mambo, the chairman of Koboko District Local Government, said they held several meetings in an attempt to resolve the conflict, but with no success.
Tension between the Ugandan families and the Yambura community took a new twist this year in April after the Yambura, comprising members of SPLA-IO, started taking land by force and destroying crops and property of Ugandan families.
The victims are mainly agricultural migrants from different districts of West Nile who moved to then uninhabited Busia in the 1970s, while the majority moved and settled there between 200 and 2008 and have established their families there for decades.
According to reports URN established, the claimants of the land in question, who speak Kakwa, moved and settled in Nyambura in the then Sudan in the 1970s. but are trying to seek a permanent return to Uganda due to the unending war in South Sudan-URN. Give us feedback on this story through our email: kamwokyatimes@gmail.com
