"Land Eviction Breeds Violence in Oil-Rich Hoima, Uganda" 24 September 2014

Land disputes in western Uganda's Lake Albertine region have become common in recent years...In a small village outside Hoima, known as Rwamutonga, more than 700 residents are crowded onto a small scrap of land.  They say they have been unfairly evicted and brutalized after a land dispute with their neighbor, Joshua Tibagwa...Tibagwa's land has attracted the interest of McAlester Energy Resources, an American company from Texas.  He says the company fronted him money to secure the land so it can be used for a petroleum waste water facility...Residents say they awoke to a hail of bullets and teargas on August 25th, followed by the burning and looting of their homes. The residents fled to the bush to escape. During the chaos they say three children went missing and are presumed dead...Two displaced women say they have been raped.  One...describes what happened when she went back to pick cassava from her old garden. "The guards detained me when I was trying to get some fresh cassava.  Four men pushed me to the ground and raped me.  I did report it to the police, but could not afford to get treated by a doctor," she said. At the police station in nearby Katanga, there is a notation in the official logbook that a woman came in to report the rape, but her file could not be found.