The illegal nets captured by the FPU operatives including the species known by their local names of ‘kokota’ (500 pieces), ‘bungulubbu’ (227 pieces), ‘manyala’ (9,000 pieces), ‘ponyoka’ (234 pieces), ‘wuzi kamba’ (145 pieces), and among others.
Fishing folk from Mukono district are praising the commander of the UPDF’s Fishing Protection Unit (FPU) Lt. Col. Mercy Tukahirwa for having lifted the ban on fishing of Mukene which has crippled them financially for over a year now.
In return, the fishing community have unanimously decided to reward Lt. Col. Tukahirwa’s appointing authority by supporting him in the forthcoming presidential elections.
They laid bare their resolution in a meeting convened by Lt. Col. Tukahirwa and attended by Mukono Resident District Commissioner (RDC) Hajat Fatuma Ndisaba Nabitaka, deputy RDC Mukono, Frank Muyambi, Assistant RDC for Buvuma, Moses Kizito Buule and local leaders in a meeting to review progress of the anti-illegal fishing campaign held at Katosi landing site on Friday.
The jubilant fishing community members hailed the FPU commander for assigning Capt. Frank Akandwanaho as the sector commander, for what they called being a down-to-earth, upright and friendly soldier who, unlike the past commanders, has a listening ear and has demystified the relationship between soldiers and civilians.
Addressing the fishing community, Col. Tukahirwa was happy to note that the one-and-half-year battle to bring soldiers and civilians on the same page in the battle to harmonize safe fishing habits has finally borne fruits.
She wondered why in the past some local leaders in the area sat back and watched as soldiers and civilians fought on the sea, ignoring peaceful options of bringing the two sides at negotiating tables to end the fracas.
“The paradox is that you were stopped illegally with no law or policy to enforce what the Minister put accross and with no options of what to do next as there was no any prior education to you; I am not mobilizing anyone to rebel but the fact is that you do not know the law until you are educated on what to do”, Tukahirwa noted.
She lamented that until she stepped in, there was a mystery on the waters with soldiers and fishermen engaging in physical brawl, and sighed relief that this situation had been dealt a death blow.
The national FPU commander ordered Capt. akandwanaho to refund all the confiscated legal fishing gears including engines, transporting means like boats, motorcycles, vehicles among others.
In her address, the RDC Fatuma Ndisaba Nabitaka observed that restoration of trust and mutual co-operation between soldiers and civilians by Col. Tukahirwa is testimony that peace and harmony in the fishing business is on the road to sanity, and hailed the Kampala-Mukono sector commander, Frank Akandwanaho for his innovative thinking to handle the matter successfully.
Ndisaba appealed to the FPU commander not to be tempted to take a one-man decision to transfer the sector commander without the consent of the local leaders.
“The running battles between the fishermen and the soldiers in the past also affected us as we received unending phone calls of fishermen reporting to us acts of our men in uniform day and night. For the months Capt. Akandwanaho has been here, the image drastically changed, I therefore can’t support any decision to take us back into the past experiences,” she noted.
She thanked him (Akandwanaho) for being a good teacher who realised that instead of brutally pushing fishermen off the water, he thought of a peaceful method of engaging them in sensitization rounds.
Akandwanaho in his report said that the lake is now a peaceful operational area, with fishermen voluntarily mentoring wayward colleagues in better fishing options than using illegal fishing gears.
He disclosed that illegal fishing nets worth sh12bn have in the recent past been confiscated and were on Friday burnt down into ashes as the fishermen observed.
The illegal nets captured by the FPU operatives including the species known by their local names of ‘kokota’ (500 pieces), ‘bungulubbu’ (227 pieces), ‘manyala’ (9,000 pieces), ‘ponyoka’ (234 pieces), ‘wuzi kamba’ (145 pieces), and among others.
Bukenya Sadam, the Mukono regional chairman for Association of Fishermen and Lake Users (AFALU) confessed that following peaceful restoration of good fishing, the association is fully committed to work with soldiers instead of engaging in running battles.
Bukenya was satisfied with the trust between the two, citing as evidence, the fact that since its inception in 2017, this is the first harmonious interaction between the army and fishing communities.
The NRM flag bearer for Mukono South parliamentary seat, Kintu Taddeo reported that despite reports in the past in which fishermen pushed for removal of soldiers from the lake, today their presence on the lake is an added sense of security.
“There has been a lot of planning for the Nile Perch, ‘mukene’ and the lake in general, but we were not supportive because we have all along been left outside the planning”, Kintu pointed out.
And the NRM flag bearer for the district woman MP seat Margaret Nakavubu expressed the fishing folk’s commitment to observe provisions of the law, their multiple problems related to their work and the lake notwithstanding. She thanked present UPDF law enforcers for restoring peace without flexing muscles with civilians.
She said, “now that peace is abundant on the lake, we are back in business and we are committed, as NRM leaders, to mobilize fishermen to support all government programmes”.
