There has been a lot of discussion after the European Parliament passed a resolution condemning the East African Crude Oil Pipeline (EACOP) project based on environmental and human rights concerns.
Deputy Speaker Thomas Tayebwa criticised the resolution,accusing Europeans of economic sabotage ,racism and interference.
Speaking in an interview with The Nile Post, human rights lawyer and the chief executive officer of Environmental Shield, Eron Kiiza said Parliament has displayed a lot ignorance in handling this oil issue.
Excerpts below.
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Who is Eron Kiiza?
I am an environmentalist, human rights lawyer. I am also a poet who performs and writes poetry. I have children, and I am married. I hail from Ntungamo District. I went to Uganda Christian University for my undergraduate studies. I went to the Law Development Centre(LDC) and I completed it.
I have more than a decade of experience in legal practice. I am also the chief executive officer of the Environment Shield, an NGO. I am a member of the national Human Rights Defender’s Coalition Uganda. I am part of civil society voices in Uganda who really crusade for social justice and human rights. I work both in Kampala but also upcountry.
Where do you get the inspiration from in championing and fighting for the rights of ordinary people in Uganda?
I think I was born like that but I try to do the right thing, fascination with the common good, public interest. I want to see what is in the interest of the larger society. I want to be foresighted not just to look at myself. I am a believer in God, I am a Christian and that is how I was born. My parents are Christians, so they schooled me in the values of faith, the values of anchoring my work on God. It is God that guards me, no one guards me.
I try to identify people who are like minded and people who are also interested in social justice, human rights and in the environment to work together and push forward these causes.
What kind or challenges do you face in executing your duties as a lawyer?
Sometimes threats are there, sometimes they are not there. The challenges are there but if you are going to work in this area and hope that there will be no challenge, then you will not be able to work. Sometimes the threats are actually very open, sometimes they deliver them on social media. I have faced death threats twice in my life but they didn’t materialise by the grace of God. They didn’t dissuade me from doing the work and my comrades find it very important.
How would you describe the state of the environment in Uganda at the moment?
The environment is bleeding. Both the wetland and forest cover are receding including plastic pollution, fume pollution and all sorts of pollution in Uganda is escalating with impunity. The people behind environmental degradation are connected to the state and to the military and some of them are so called investors, they are fake investors. They build factories in the wetlands, in the middle of forests.
These are natural assets that God gave us to first of all to feed and shelter us, entertain us but also give us money and develop us but the investors are eating them up. The biggest threat to our environment is the lack of state seriousness to uniformly and strictly enforce environmental laws and the environmental commitments.
The oil firms and the government have on several times assured the nation that there are measures that have been put in place to protect the environment during the exploration of oil. Do you doubt some of those measures?
This is not the first environment sensitive project we are undertaking and as I have told you there is a track record of not following environmental laws in this country. People will abuse them with impunity. The oil curse could come here if we continue with the road we are on. You saw what happened in the Naija Delta. You saw the spills; you saw the pollution and it is coming here if we go on with the oil project and scientists have confirmed that oil spills are inevitable.
There is a culture here of impunity and a culture of disregarding anything that reduces your profit if you are an investor.
The Deputy Speaker of Parliament, Thomas Tayebwa accused Members of European Union Parliament of economic sabotage, racism and interference over a motion seeking to block the oil pipeline project. What do you think?
No, he (Tayebwa) is the one who is being racist. I think he is displaying a lot of ignorance in this project. First of all, he wants to stop Europeans from commenting on European companies. EACOP is a European company, it is majority owned. For us we have only 30% of the entire project.
The company itself is not registered here; it is registered in the UK. So, why would you stop Europeans from talking about their company if it is not racism and ignorance, unwarranted anger.
It is not racism, the facts are this, human rights are universal. There are human rights challenges with this project in Uganda. The environment does not know borders. This oil project will cover green project assets like forests, the lake basins including Lake Albert itself which is shared by Congo as well.
President Museveni insists that no one will stop the project
For the first time, he is admitting that Total can withdraw. You cannot stop Europeans from taking about EACOP and he is not going to detain, or torture those European MPs who are taking about EACOP. Maybe if they were here, they would be harassed. What are you going to do with European MPs? So the president has nothing to do about it. He can wait and hope that Total doesn’t withdraw.
Does he have the money? He is a politician; he is engaging in political rhetoric but the thing is that he needs Total and he needs it desperately. If it withdraws, it will be unlikely that he will find someone who is willing to step in where Total has feared.
What do you make of an online petition condemning the resolution that is making rounds on social media?
They are becoming humble; the EU resolution has humbled them. They are resorting to the opposition and civil society tactics of petition. They are welcome to our world. I support their freedom of expression. It is an acknowledgement finally that petitions matter, that tweets matter and I guess that is why they are still closing Facebook. They don’t want us to speak but they want to speak when they have issues to air. Freedom of expression is very important. Why is the government still closing Facebook resorting to online petitions?
There has been a lot of discussion regarding human rights violations, governance issues among others in Uganda. What can be done to change the situation?
Human rights and torture incidents are escalating. Political opposition is very vulnerable to senseless random arrest, torture and all forms of harassment. Sometimes it has gotten so bad that they even extend it to business rights. The situation is getting worse with the Muhoozi project and we can only pray to God that either God directly intervenes or he sends a liberator, this country needs healing.
How is the Muhoozi project making the situation worse in Uganda in terms of human rights?
Because, they have to sell very unpopular candidates. They have to promote him as untouchable as someone you cannot talk about and that is how Kakwenza finds himself in trouble when he engages with him in a bitter quarrel on Twitter. He is so traumatised. He is suffering from post-stress traumatic disorder and he is not yet healed . It is one of the consequences of torture. It is about trauma from torture. It can last for many years.
What is the fate of Rukirabashaija Kakwenza, the novelist you represented?
Kakwenza is the man on the run. The criminal charges they fabricated against him are still in court although they have failed to arrest him and they want to arrest him. They are still have his passport. You know, even the last time, the children applied for passports and it was a tug of war to get them. He remains harassed even in exile but remains strong. He remains steadfast and he is healing and recovering slowly from the trauma that resulted from his multiple torture.
