PAPs interviewed for this story describe arbitrary and coercive methods targeting anyone unwilling to allow oil operations go on without asking uncomfortable questions. Speaking out has been made so toxic that PAPs such as Karungi and Adriko chose to sign onto compensation below the value of their properties, instead of antagonising the government.
On March 17, the Buganda road Court further remanded eight environmental activists over common nuisance charges linked to a protest against East African Crude Oil Pipeline (EACOP).
By the time of their next scheduled appearance in court on April 10, the eight activists, operating under the umbrella body Rooted in Resistance (formerly students Against EACOP), will have spent more eight months and nine days in jail.
The Rooted in Resistance activists, were charged under a minor, colonial era law for being a common nuisance.
By their next appearance in court, the activists will have spent over two thirds of their maximum custodial sentence in pre-trial detention.
The long pre-trial detention and the arrests of people exercising a constitutionally guaranteed right to associate and protest is a feature not a bug of Uganda’s oil extraction story.
Citizens across the board report being harassed, intimidated and punished for daring to ask questions related to oil exploration and production in the Albertine region.
“I have been harassed, intimidated and sometimes I had to flee my home for safety. I only came back after I felt it was fine to resurface,” says Maxwell Atuhura, a resident of the oil-producing district of Buliisa.
A two-month investigation supported by court documents, petitions from Project Affected Persons (PAPs), field visits and interviews with communities in the Albertine Region sheds light on how communities have been traumatised in pursuit of favourable public relations for EACOP and other oil production infrastructure projects.
The repression and fear in the community is among other things allowing oil companies, the sub-contractors and government contractors to grab properties without compensation.
PAPs interviewed for this story describe arbitrary and coercive methods targeting anyone unwilling to allow oil operations go on without asking uncomfortable questions.
Companies such as Daqing Oilfield Construction Company Limited (DOCCL) are taking advantage of this pursuit of opaqueness to cheat PAPs, poison the environment and generally hurt public good.
DOCCL, a subsidiary of the China National Petroleum Corporation, was sub-contracted by CNOOC Uganda Limited under EPC-4 contract to construct a 47.6 kilometre feeder pipeline from Kingfisher in Kikuube district to Kabaale industrial hub in Hoima.
Following the start of work by DOCCL, residents have since 2024, petitioned authorities, alleging consistent environmental degradation, destruction of wetlands and water sources, and failure to adhere to environmental guidelines.
The company previously stated that environmental protection was integral to its operations and pledged to replace cleared trees.
However, during a February 2026, visit, residents claimed restoration commitments had not been fully met, although DOCCL appears to have already completed its work.
The pipeline has already been constructed and the high-voltage line installed-buried underground with mark stones visible, but residents feel cheated.
The community reports some collection of construction materials from people’s land without appropriate compensation, while unwanted debris is dumped in their gardens.
Unwanted debris was dropped on the periphery of Hohwa stream creating an avenue for possible pollution, while also inconveniencing pedestrians and residents fetching water.
Residents, additionally reported loss of property as excavation machines went out of their way to dig up uncompensated crops and land.
Yet that is not the worst of the transgressions against residents in this part of the country, where Uganda is set to start producing and pumping oil in July 2026.
There have been instances of land grabbing and undervaluation of people’s property.
Sosten Leti Adriko is one of the PAPs whose land was undervalued. He says compensation for his 24.8 decimal piece of land and property taken for the construction of the feeder pipeline wasn’t fair.
He reports being offered sh800, 000 for his property, yet at the time of compensation in 2018, the land alone should have been worth sh2million.
The land value alone and without the property has since doubled to shs4million.
Rose Karungi Abooki a resident of Kaseeta-Nyanseke village tells a similar story of her property being undervalued.
“I had a house and crops on my land but was given a measly sh12 million in an oil producing area,” she says. For her five acres, plus the house and crops, she had expected sh50 million.
They made me sign in the presence of their Lawyer by force, as the alternative was losing out.
Because of that relocation, Karungi reports a lowering in her quality of life, as she left a big, spacious house for one that is too small for her big household of close to 20 people.
Karungi and Adriko both say they chose to take the money, despite the amount being too small for fear of ending up like other members of the community in Albertine who now have been left with nothing, despite their property being taken for oil.
Jelousy Mugisha, a resident of Kasinyi village in Buliisa district, is one such PAP who has been left with nothing because he rejected the compensation that was offered.
Mugisha’s land was earmarked for the establishment of a feeder pipeline connecting to Tilenga oil wells run by TotalEnergies EP Uganda Limited.
He rejected sh12.4 million in compensation for his house and two acres of land.
He argued in his contestation of the amount that the going rate for a similar acre of land in his area was sh20 million.
As an alternative, Mugisha asked for relocation, where TotalEnergies EP would buy him land, build him a house and make him whole but this option was rejected.
The government chose instead to deposit his sh12.4 million in court as they wait for resolution of the court case.
“We asked for land but the government instead took the money to court. We went to court of appeal in 2023 as a family to date no answer and the case has never been fixed for hearing. The case should be fixed for judgement so that if we are not contented with the outcome we go to a higher court,” says Mugisha.
In September 2024 last year after his house was submerged by flooding, Mugisha reported the matter to government and oil companies but there was no compensation or attempt to relocate him.
The house and surrounding land flooded after TotalEnergies EP released water from Tilenga, on the shores of Lake Albert. The French firm released the water while constructing an access road to Ngiri 2 Oil Pad.
“We now live in poverty,” says Mugisha, before adding that the life in squalor is worsened by persecution from security forces.
Mugisha reports receiving threatening calls and having to go into two months long hiding with his family in February last year.
For this story, this Publication sent emails to the Petroleum Authority of Uganda (PAU) and EACOP Limited for a response to all the allegations but never received a response.
Further efforts to get a response from TotaEnergies and CNOOC were futile.
Disdain for persons or organisation raising concerns in the Albertine, can be best illustrated by Ernest Rubondo one of the most senior officials in Uganda’s oil extraction business.
While presiding over an August 23, 2025 ceremony for CNOOC to handover donated medical equipment to Kyangwali Health Centre IV in Kikuube district, Rubondo the PAU Executive Direct warned residents against listening to civil society organisations.
Rubondo noted improvement in road infrastructure and health facilities as justification for residents to stop complaining about the harm that oil companies might cause them.
Some residents appear to have listened to this call. Innocent Mwebaze a field coordinator with Oil Refinery Residents Association reports knowing of at least 300 people across the Albertine, whose land has been taken without compensation.
For fear of the consequences, as government workers increasingly target any form of dissent against oil activities in the Albertine, Mwebaze says many PAPs have decided to remain silent.
Speaking out has been made so toxic that PAPs such as Karungi and Adriko chose to sign onto compensation below the value of their properties, instead of antagonising the government.
Karungi and Adriko report deciding to sign onto agreements they were contesting, while pursuing other ways for accessing proper compensation.
This category of PAPs Karungi, Adriko say they decided to participate in public demonstrations and protests and hoping for a review the agreements they signed under duress.
Yet the protests did not yield any results, as the army and police immediately dispersed the protestors.
These PAPs even reported his grievances to government offices in Albertine region.
To their surprise officials such as the then Kikuube Resident District Commissioner (RDC), Amlan Tumusiime, summoned the PAPs and asked them to apologise for sabotaging government projects.
Adriko was arrested for criminal incitement and staging an illegal demonstration.
Life for him since then has become a nightmare. “I am traumatised and sometimes I regret that oil was discovered here,” says Adriko who has since ran away for fear of persecution.
He now rents a single room house in a place he could not disclose for fear of retribution with his wife and children.
Other residents in Buliisa districts raised similar complaints including inadequate compensation, flooding linked to construction activities and intimidation after attempting to petition authorities.
Mugisha reports started a grassroots organisation to advocate for himself and other PAPs has lived with consistent persecution since 2018 when he first showed dissident views.
The government, which refused to register his organisation has previously kidnapped him and only released following pressure from national and international organisations.
In December 2019, they picked him from Entebbe International Airport, on his way from France, where he had gone to witness the hearing of a human rights violations case against French Firm, TotalEnergis EP Uganda Limited.
His eventual release followed the interventions of several organisations including the United Nations, the French Embassy, Friends of East and Africa Institute for Energy Governance (AFIEGO).
Before release, his captors cautioned against “continued sabotage of the oil project,” as it could cost him his life.
Mugisha started Community Voices and Plan Organisation (COVAPO), which he has severally tried, but failed to register.
“They (Buliisa community department) refused to give a certificate on the pretext I want to bring money from Whites to sabotage oil-with no valid basis. Those who applied for formalisation after me have been registered,” he says.
Adding: “I fear to walk and socialise freely as we used to before the onset of oil exploration.”
Mugisha among other things rarely has phone conversations over safety concerns.
Even for this interview, his primary demands included a physical meeting for fear of entrapment.
The kind of harassment against people such as Mugisha has created a chilling effect on the community to the extent that there are people who would rather lose their land, than put targets on their backs.
Maxwell Atuhura, a resident of Buliisa and activist says oil firms are using the government to crackdown on dissidents, gain widespread acquiescence and conformism from the population.
Oil firm that have had to fight negative opinions nationally and internationally adopted the silencing of communities from the Albertine region as a winning strategy.
Atuhura who is involved in advocating for the rights of PAPs narrates persecution, as a human rights defender in the Albertine, because of the several robberies at his house.
When civil society organisations have been ransacked in state related crimes against human rights defenders in Uganda, computers and phones are among the often-targeted items and this is true for Atuhura’s house as well.
Atuhura who run for Parliament but lost in the just concluded 2026 general election reports being ignored by the police for a government saboteur, when he reported these crimes.
Other instances of government persecution providing cover for oil companies to exploit communities in the Albertine include what is now termed as orphaned land.
Janepher Baitwamasa an administrator at Navigators of Development Association (NAVODA) says that her organisation did a study on patches of land situated between EACOP and the multi-purpose pipeline leading to and from delivery the oil delivery points.
While the oil firms have so far refused to compensate this “orphaned land”, the owners cannot utilise it due to the presence of oil infrastructure makes meaningful use of these parcels difficult.
In 2021, TotalEnergies announced plans to evaluate the effect of losing residual land on PAPs but the report findings were never made public.
Baitwamasa says PAPs have increasingly asked for this land to be included in compensation, citing a case of Kijumba in Kigaaga parish, Buseruka sub-county, Hoima district but the government and oil firms have not acted.
The NAVODA administrator also says violations including employment (labour), safety, socio-economic and environmental rights violation, among others, have increased and the ideal have become frozen in time.
“The sector is moving into actual production stage despite the authorities keeping a blind eye and no sign that the state would reform its position on rights,” says Baitwamasa, who notes EACOP completion of 98 per cent.
According to Baitwamasa, the rate at which government and oil firms are ignoring emerging challenges in the Albertine has increased due to the harassment of PAPs and human rights defenders.
He cites the targeting of AFIEGO as one that has had a chilling effect on the ability of communities to fight back.
The increased silence by civil society organisation means no one can amplify incidents like the one of David Muhanuzi, 45 and resident of Kyakapeya cell in Hoima City.
Muhanuzi sustained severe injuries in May 2023 when a truck allegedly delivering drilling equipment knocked him at Boma playgrounds.
Uganda Revenue Authority records show that the truck and carrier, registration number UBM 379P and UBM 127E belong to WSL Engineering Services Limited.
Muhanuzi sustained multiple fractures on his left limb. Medics say his limb must be amputated, but he has not gotten around to doing this, as he cannot afford the costs.
Muhanuzi has not been compensation, so he has to find all the resources necessary for his treatment. To raise some of the medical bills, he sold his land.
Property loss and reduced capacity to earn is costing Muhanuzi his family, as his wife left and his children have dropped out of school, adding him to the long list of PAPs in the Albertine whose families are disintegrating.
Daily Daybreak originally published this article as part of the Environmental Defenders Journalism Grant 2025
The original publication can be accessed at https://dailydaybreak.com/2026/03/29/uganda-builds-oil-production-future-on-foundation-of-broken-families-and-injustice/