UPPDF soldiers guard cattle recovered from South Sudanese rustlers at Bibia parish, Atiak Subcounty Amuru district in May 2018.
The Uganda People’s Defence Forces (UPDF) have forcefully evicted South Sudanese nomadic pastoralists who had been illegally grazing thousands of cattle on Atiak Sugar Factory plantation in Atiak Sub-county, Amuru district.
The eviction exercise carried out last week, followed months of concerns over unauthorized grazing by a group of Dinka nomadic pastoralists on the sugarcane plantation owned by Horyal Investment holding Company.
According to the sugarcane plantation officials, the pastoralists had been illegally grazing on parts of the sugarcane plantation since 2022 after crossing the porous border point between Atiak Sub-county and Magwi county in South Sudan.
Maj Gen Felix Busizoori, the Fourth Infantry Division Commander told our reporter on Friday that a total of 5,590 heads of cattle belonging to the South Sudanese pastoralists had been evicted out of the plantation by Thursday last week.
Gen Busizoori said that the herds of cattle were escorted by UPDF soldiers across the Uganda South Sudan border.
“We evicted and escorted the cows to the border; they crossed the border. Sometime you fail to understand who is who, all along we thought they were Acholi but we realized they are South Sudanese, “said Gen Busizoori.
He however said that the porous border point facilitated their entry into the country where they had been grazing their cattle since 2022.
Gen Busizoori noted that two of the pastoralists were armed adding that during the eviction operation, they fled before being apprehended by the UPDF soldiers.
Leonard Komakech, the Atiak Sugar Public Relations Officer told Uganda Radio Network in an interview that the cattle had greatly destroyed young cane in the plantation amounting to millions of shillings.
According to Komakech, the cattle were being grazed on about five pivot centers at the plantation, with each pivot center covering between 150 to 165 acres of land bringing total damage to an estimated 750 acres of sugarcane plantation.
Komakech said eight different groups of the Dinka tribe commanded by two individuals were behind the illegal grazing along the banks of River Unyama.
“As I speak, at least we are happy, we have not gotten any information that they are coming back to the sugar factory plantation land,” said Komakech.
The eviction operation coincides with the current eviction of the balaalo cattle keepers out of North and North Eastern Uganda under the Executive Order No 2 issued by President Yoweri Museveni last month.
The order issued to address land related conflicts between the host communities and the balaalo pastoralists has so far seen 12,314 cattle evicted across West Acholi and West Nile Subregions by Friday last week according to Gen Busizoori.
Gen Busizoori highlighted that the operation was moving smoothly albeit challenges of transport the cattle keepers were facing to move out their cattle.
“We have 1,500 cattle in holding areas, but there is a big challenge of transport they (balaalo) are facing. They are failing to get trucks, and this affects transportation,” said Gen Busizoori.
At Atiak Sugar Factory, at least 537 heads of cattle belonging to balaalo cattle keepers who had been illegally grazing on the sugarcane plantation had been forcefully evicted by Friday.
However according to Komakech, a number of the cattle keepers have gone into hiding and left their cattle to roam freely and currently destroying sugarcane on the plantation.
“These people are just hiding in the plantation land; they are no longer in their kraal and their animals are just wandering around because they know it’s very easy for us to track them if they stay in the kraal,”
Adding that “So they just keep on separating the animals in the different fields. But you know animals, it’s very hard to hide them, you hear them mooing.”
Atiak Sugar factory currently has sugarcane planted on approximately 5,000 acres of land. However, in the past, the factory faced numerous setbacks especially with fire outbreak in the plantation prompting a new strategy to mechanize agriculture.
The government has so far sunk in 553.7 billion shillings in the operation of the sugar factory while Horyal Investment Holding Company Ltd injected 164 billion shillings in the joint venture business.
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