[발췌:] Push for transparency at G8 alone will not solve land grabs in Africa

자료: http://rosebellkagumire.com/2013/06/17/push-for-transparency-at-g8-alone-will-not-solve-land-grabs-in-africa/
지은이: Rosebell Idaltu Kagumire, JUNE 17, 2013


※ 발췌 (excerpt):

[In] 2012, a few months before he passed away, Ethipian Prime Minister Meles Zenawi while attending the World Economic Forum on Africa was asked a question that intrigues most African citizens. Why do African leaders-revolutionaries turn to looting their own countries once in power? The (...) leader of Ethiopia responded by highlighting foreign corporations' role in impoverishing Africa. He hinted that African leaders, in their quest to find jobs for an increasing unemployed populatin, were being held hostage by corporations that come in to invest.

“The vast majority of the loot[ing] is done by properly organized companies through all sorts of accounting gimmicks,” he said. “I think that is the most insidious form of corruption. It affects everybody, including those whose hands are not in the till.”

True as it may be, the response was just one sided. ( ... ... )

( ... ... ) land grabbing has also become an every day reality in most African countries. ( ... )

In August 2001, the Ugandan army violently expelled over 400 peasants families from their land in the district of Mubende and leased the land to Kaweri Coffee Plantation Ltd., which is full subsidiary of the German Neumann Kaffee Gruppe (NKG) based in Hamburg.

Over 10 years the company has used the land to establish a large-scale coffee plantation. FIAN, an international human rights organization the right to adequate food has issued reports on efforts by 400 evicted families to get justice in vain.

Both the company and Uganda government in this case have denied local peasants their rights as listed down in the international Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights. FIAN, an organization working on right to food lodged a formal complaint to  the Germany’s National Contact Point (NCP)for OECD Guidelines for Multi-national Enterprises but still the matter is not yet solved.

In the same district, in 2010, a UK-registered – The New Forest Company (NFC) was involved in what Oxfam described as illegal eviction of some 20,000 Ugandan peasants from arable land to plant trees.

The company had been given a go-ahead by the Uganda National Forestry Authority , which licensed NFC’s operations in 2005 and permitted the company to evict the residents in Mubende and Kiboga districts whom they said were encroachers.  NFC had attracted investments from International and European banks to expand their Ugandan plantation.

After the international spotlight NFC suspended operations in Uganda to give way for negotiations and mediation.

For the last 20 years the Ugandan regime headed by President Museveni has concentrated more on attracting Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) at the expense of local investment. Most of these foreign companies in agriculture come in the name of employment but what they really do is increase food insecurity as more land meant for food production is given up through investment deals.

( ... ... )