Members of the Acholi war debt claimants say they have evidence linking senior army officers to loss of private property during the Lord’s Resistance Army-LRA insurgency in northern Uganda. It follows recent claims by President Yoweri Museveni that cows and goats people residents are demanding compensation for were eaten by rebels.
Last week, Museveni clashed with Betty Aol, Gulu District Woman Member of Parliament over compensating the victims who lost property during the war. Aol told the President during the launch of the Gulu-Atyak-Nimule road that government must compensate the war victims for the loss of property. But in his reaction, Museveni said by demanding for compensation, Aol is making it appear as if the cows were stolen by government troops.
He explained that government can only offer assistance in form of resettlement package to the people who were formerly displaced by the war because their animals were allegedly eaten by the rebels not government troops. But Engineer Noah Oponya, chairperson of the more than 20,000 war debt claimants says they have evidence of individual government soldiers who looted property from civilians during the insurgency.
Oponya explains that the more than 20,000 war debt claimants in Acholi cannot be affected by the president’s statement because the case is before courts of law. He says that officials from the office of the attorney general late last year moved in all the Sub-counties in Acholi to verify the claimants.
Oponya says the issue should not be on who ate the animals but government failure to protect the people and their property. The Acholi war debt claimants are demanding shillings 1.4 trillion in compensation from government for over 400,000 heads of cattle lost during the war in northern Uganda.
