US climate rights watchdog Climate Rights International said in a report on Monday that the Kingfisher oil project along Lake Albert, Uganda fuels widespread human rights violations of the local population. The report stated that in addition to environmental damage that threatens their livelihoods, locals are subjected to forced evictions and disappearances, labor rights violations and gender-based sexual violence.
According to the report, locals suffered from intimidation, violence, forced evictions and oil and chemical pollution. The Ugandan Peoples’ Defence Forces (UPDF) was accused by interviewees of violence, forcing evictions, destroying fishing boats and intimidating locals. This allegedly resulted in the loss of livelihoods, such as the loss of consuming multiple meals per day. Locals who worked for the Chinese National Overseas Oil Corporation’s (CNOOC) subcontractors also reported poor treatment, such as low wages, excessive hours, hazardous working conditions and demands for bribes to obtain jobs. Some demands contravened Ugandan law.
The report recommended the Ugandan government instruct Uganda’s security forces to cease human rights violations regarding all oil projects, investigate and prosecute violations such as abuses by security forces and conform to the country’s international human rights obligations. The report also urged TotalEnergies, majority owner of the project, to publicly state that “all allegations contained in the report about the behavior of UPDF and other security forces should be investigated by an independent and impartial entity, that those responsible for violations should be prosecuted, and that full compensation will be paid to victims.”
Previously, on June 5, a published press release by the Environment Governance Institute (EGI) stated that the UPDF arrested Ugandan environmental activist Stephen Kwikiriza in Kampala, Uganda under “alarming circumstances”. Kwikiriza was from the Kingfisher project area and had been campaigning against developing the East African Crude Oil Pipeline. The EGI stated that Kwikiriza had been living in a safe place in an “undisclosed location” since March due to alleged UPDF threats.
