Namyalo tells village chairpersons to steer clear of land disputes

Village chairpersons should stay out of land disputes and focus on serving residents, a senior official in Uganda’s ruling party has said.

Hadijjah Namyalo, who manages the Office of the National Chairman (ONC) — the National Resistance Movement (NRM) office headed by President Yoweri Museveni — said most land conflicts began at village level.

She warned that investigations into such disputes would look closely at the role of local council (LC1) chairpersons and other officials expected to prevent them.

Namyalo, popularly known as Chief Muzzukulu, said chairpersons who wanted to serve with integrity had to put the interests and welfare of the voters who elected them first.

She was speaking at St Lawrence University in Lubaga Division, Kampala, at a meeting of LC1 and LC2 chairpersons from the city and surrounding areas. The gathering discussed setting up a nationwide network to help village leaders coordinate their work.

The chairpersons elected Norbert Twizire, who chairs Nsambya Hospital Zone in Makindye Division, as their national coordinator.

Twizire said the new association would press for villages to receive a fairer share of national resources and development opportunities, which leaders could then pass on to residents.

He said village chairpersons had long been left on the sidelines because they lacked a coordinated framework through which to advocate for the people they represented.

The meeting follows last month’s LC1 elections. The polls were held on 28 July across 71,214 villages, renewing the structures that serve as the first link between citizens and government. LC1 chairpersons’ duties include conflict resolution and land matters, alongside coordinating programmes such as the Parish Development Model and Operation Wealth Creation.