The Uganda Land Alliance in partnership with the Ministry of Lands, Housing and Urban Development and Mystic Multimedia are organising the inaugural Uganda Land Awareness Week 2013 under the theme “Land: My Life, My Future?” from the 25-29 November 2013 at the Sheraton Hotel and Gardens, Kampala.
This event will bring together representatives from government, civil society, academia, technical leadership, development partners, the private sector, schools and the general public to discuss land issues in Uganda.
Uganda’s history is anchored in land tenure systems characterised by the early tribal conquest that determined national settlement pattersn and production systems. The coming of Arabs through ivory trade introduced the subordination of women as land for growing of communal crops for barter trade with the Arabs, Indians and the British when they arrived in the 1880’s.
With the British came colonisations that saw a dramatic shif in land holding. The 1900 Buganda Agreement introduced land legislation. Land in Uganda was subdivided by the British Crown. It created a feudal system that has persisted to this day, creating untold suffereing to the subservient rights holders.
Land conflicts have escalated in recent years throughout the country, causing land speculation that may trigger additional conflicts. Land is a social, cultural, economic and political good, and its governance impacts in the very existence and unity of its people.
The Land Awareness Week is therefore designed as a bridge between the history and the future in a bid to build synergies and a common understanding of our destiny as a people. It will seek to open up the sector to the general public, making it more relevant and accessible to those it is intended to serve.
Land Awareness Week will bring togehter all actors in the sector with the hope of creating linkages to improve land services delivery to Ugandans. Through the various activities, it is hope that the Land Awareness Week will awaken a sense of nationalism and national unity for the future of Uganda.
