A minister’s decision to redistribute land belonging to two Danish investors could cost Ugandan taxpayers Ush250 million ($93,000), after President Yoweri Museveni pledged to compensate the investors for losses suffered.

The land had been redistributed to squatters by State Minister for Lands Aidah Nantaba, who has been in office less than two months, along with parcels of land belonging to other investors.

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The minister redistributed several parcels of land in central Uganda owned by a real estate investor in Luweero district, by Riis Coffee in Buikwe district, by Danuga Farm Uganda and Eriyo Paulo Kiwanuka, a businessman in Kayunga district.

President Museveni agreed to compensate two companies owned by the Danes in a meeting held on December 17. The State House meeting focused only on the Danish investors, who had written letters to the president and police chief Lt Gen Kale Kayihura seeking protection from Ms Nantaba.

The minister’s action also attracted a protest note from the Danish embassy in Kampala, which referred to an agreement between the Uganda and Denmark governments.

The embassy argued that by allowing the minister to destroy the investments, Uganda was reneging on an agreement signed in 2001 to promote and protect investments belonging to each other’s nationals in the two countries.

During the State House meeting, Museveni promised to keep Ms Nantaba out of the investors’ land. The investors sought an audience with the president to demand compensation for crops, vehicles and buildings destroyed during the takeover of the land.

A taskforce headed by Attorney General Peter Nyombi will determine the amounts lost and how to resettle the squatters the minister had redistributed the land to. “First we have appointed a technical team that will go to the ground and establish the facts,” said Mr Nyombi.

The investors to be compensated include Trine Riis Jensen, Svend Kaare Jensen, Kristen Hoiler and Michael Hoiler of Riis Coffee and Jorh Hawsen of Danuga Farm Uganda who is constructing a food processing plant in Kayunga district.

Ms Nantaba had redistributed 829,380 acres of land owned by Danuga Farm Uganda. Danuga Farm bought the land from former Internal Security Organisation boss Brigadier Henry Tumukunde. Riis Coffee bought its 158 acres from Ham Mukasa Galabuzi, with the intention of establishing a coffee farm and factory.

In both cases the squatters were to be compensated by the titleholders. While Brigadier Tumukunde says he compensated the squatters on his land, Mr Galabuzi failed to compensate some of his squatters.

Trine Riis Jensen, managing director of Riis Coffee, said that because the process of compensation was taking a long time and delaying their investments, the company agreed to compensate the remaining squatters and deduct the money from its payment to Mr Galabuzi.

Mrs Jensen said that by the time the junior lands minister came in to redistribute her company’s land, only 12 squatters were yet to be compensated.

These 12 squatters, Mrs Jensen said, had so far refused to meet Riis Coffee’s agents.

Both Mrs Jensen and Brigadier Tumukunde accuse Ms Nantaba, who is also the woman Member of Parliament for Kayunga district, of siding with the squatters for the sake of political capital.

However, Ms Nantaba said the squatters had been compensated with “peanuts,” which is why she intervened in both cases. Under Uganda’s land law a squatter who has lived on a piece of land for 12 years is entitled to compensation even when one has already compensated the titleholder of that same land.

Both investors had sued the minister but they complained to President Museveni once Ms Nantaba used his name to have several squatters released from prison.

In one incident, Ms Nantaba, claiming she was sent by the president, directed a court to release 10 squatters whom Danuga Farm Uganda had sued for destruction of property.

“All accused persons have been released on the directive of H E the President of Uganda Y K Museveni. He promised to pay their bail totalling Ush1.5 million ($558),” stated a court document releasing the 10 squatters on September 28.

The minister’s claims that she was sent by the president are believable because President Museveni, for two months, refused to swear in ministers he had appointed when parliament refused to approve Ms Nantaba’s appointment.

At the time, President Museveni said that Ms Nantaba had been helping him to fight land grabbers in Kayunga district. The President then called the National Resistance Movement caucus and wrote several letters to the Speaker until parliament approved Ms Nantaba as State Minister for Lands.

Ms Nantaba re-echoed the president’s statements when she accused the members of parliament’s appointments committee of colluding with senior army officers to fight her. The minister had accused the senior army officers of being land grabbers in Kayunga district.

In the past, Ugandan taxpayers have lost $16.4 million to little known Dura Cement, as a result of President Museveni’s direction that its mining contract be cancelled and granted to Lafarge.

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