Half a million Ugandans at risk of landslides


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500,000 people in Uganda are at a risk of being hit by landslides and floods, the government has said today.

“So far 300,000 people in eastern Uganda have left their homes in eastern
Uganda and 500,000 are at risk of being hit by landslides. Since it is continuing to rain, we are likely to experience more landslides.” said the minister of state for disaster preparedness, Musa Ecweru.

Ecweru said those displaced in districts of Butaleja, Budaka and Tororo have lost all their food crops and livestock which were washed away by floods and are now in need of relief.

He attributed the landslides to increasing population which has led people to settle on mountain slopes. He said the people cut trees and cultivate on the mountain slopes making it easy for landslides to occur.

Last week, Uganda’s president Yoweri Kaguta Museveni visited the village and warned people against living at the foot of landslide prone mountains.

Musa Ecweru said that 300 people are still missing after the landslides that occurred recently in eastern Uganda. According to the minister 83 bodies have so far been recovered but they are still continuing to look for the dead bodies.

Chairman of the Bududa district at the eastern part of the country, Wilson Watira, last Wednesday said that about 60 students of Nametsi primary school “were taking shelter from heavy rainfall in one of the buildings which was totally destroyed and covered by mud and rocks brought down by landslides.”

“Their parents have testified that the children are nowhere to be seen. They are likely to have died,” Watira said.

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