Kampala, State of Buganda: Buganda Land Board, the body charged with managing the kingdom’s land, says on its website that the six-months “promotional” campaign meant to issue leases to tenants on the land it manages – dubbed Kyapa Mungalo – is “optional”.
The five-point note on the website adds that “only those interested in elevating themselves from being kibanja holders to title holders and add value to their land are invited to respond” to the call, and that those who are unwilling or unable to embrace the call will remain kibanja holders subject to paying the statutory rental fees (busuulu) as determined by the central government.

During the promotional period, the note continues, premium costs of getting a 49-year lease will be cut by 70 per cent, and the lease agreement, a copy of which Saturday Monitor has seen, provides for automatic renewal of the lease after the expiry of 49 years if one is still interested.
In case someone is unable to renew the lease or is no longer interested, the notes state, one is free to revert to his or her former status as a kibanja holder subject to regularly paying the kibanja rental fees.
But the initiative, launched by Katikkiro (prime minster) Charles Peter Mayiga last month, has attracted significant criticisms from different circles, including from ministers in the central government.

“It is only President Museveni who can call this young man (Mayiga) to order. I do not believe that the people of Buganda have failed to pay ground rent (busuulu) which is the known constitutional procedure for all tenants on Buganda Kingdom land,” Minister Without Portfolio Abdul Nadduli was quoted by Saturday Monitor to have said at a function in Luweero on May 6.
“It seems leaders in Mengo led by the Katikkiro are trying to push government to do something which will make it unpopular. People in Buganda could easily mistake President Museveni to be part of the 49-year lease project fronted by Mengo. A few people in Mengo could easily work against the Kabaka by making him unpopular through the land lease project,” Mr Nadduli warned.
Mr Nadduli’s criticism, particularly his reference to the likelihood of the kingdom losing popularity, has been fronted by many.

Ms Idah Nantaba, the state minister for Information Communication Technology, who presented herself as an advocate for tenants’ rights in the fight against evictions during her time as junior Lands minister, has also criticised the initiative, arguing that many sitting tenants cannot afford the lease fees.
But the most acerbic critics of the Kyapa Mungalo initiative are former presidential spokesperson Joseph Tamale Mirundi and the outspoken Muslim cleric Sheikh Nuuhu Muzaata-Batte.
A long-time critic of Mengo officials, Mr Mirundi, on radio and television shows, accused Mengo officials of corruption regarding land matters and urged tenants not to embrace the initiative. Sheikh Muzaata also on a number of occasions, before and after the launch of Kyapa Mungalo, attacked Mr Mayiga and has predicted doom for the initiative.

Shortly after Mr Mayiga was appointed Katikkiro in 2013, Sheikh Muzaata went on the offensive, accusing him of bringing down a historical mosque in Lubiri, Mengo. And the frosty relations between the two have never thawed.
In response to the criticism, Buganda Land Board released what it called details of lease applications to the same body by both Mr Mirundi and Sheikh Muzaata. Confronted with this claim during a morning show on NBS Television, Mr Mirundi pushed and threatened to beat up the host, Mr Simon Muyanga Lutaaya.
Mr Mirundi and Sheikh Muzaata declined to speak to Saturday Monitor for this story, citing different reasons. Whereas Mr Mirundi accused this newspaper of fighting him on behalf of people he called his enemies, Sheikh Muzaata said we had called him “at the wrong time”.

More questions
Kampala Affairs minister Beti Kamya told a press conference that the Kabaka’s official estate vested in the institution of the Kabaka in the 1900 agreement has since been parceled out to the descendants of former Kabaka Daudi Chwa, the grandfather of Kabaka Mutebi, and that the reigning king should not through Buganda Land Board continue to control the entire 350 square miles.
“It implies that the land belonging to Kabaka Mutebi is not the 350 square miles. It is far smaller than the 350 square miles,” Mr Kamya said.

Buganda Land Board says on its website that it manages the 350 square miles – the Kabaka’s official Kabaka’s mailo - that was returned to Buganda in 1993, and another 300 square miles President Museveni returned to the kingdom in 2013.
In reference to this, Ms Kamya listed three sets of land including land entrusted to the counties, to the Queen Mother, and the sub-counties whose control, she said, Mengo must open up to discussion.
“Which land is the Katikkiro and Mengo asking the people of Buganda to get titled leases on. If it is the Kabaka’s land, it is his prerogative to treat his land as he wants but if it is these other categories , it is not Mengo’s, the Katikkiro’s or even the Kabaka’s prerogative to dish out this land as they want,” she said.

She suggested that there must be discussions in the Buganda Lukiiko (Assembly) on the solution. But if what she terms as an impasse persists then she suggests a referendum on Buganda’s land.
The other option, Ms Kamya suggests, is giving freehold titles to the people of Buganda, something the kingdom is opposed to on grounds that the people who get the titles may sell off the land as has happened in the past and future generations of the kingdom will be landless.
Mr Mayiga has also argued that Buganda Kingdom will exist “forever”, meaning that at any point in time it must have land. He compares it to institutions such as the Catholic Church, which only offer leases on their land.

Ms Kamya, at the time of writing this story, said she stood by her views as expressed earlier, although she referred this newspaper to the Lands minister to follow up.
Mukono Municipality MP Betty Nambooze, while expressing support for the drive to grant leases to tenants as a way of securing their tenure and raising the value of the land, wrote on her Facebook account that the “unnecessary” criticism that the initiative has seen would have been avoided if Mr Mayiga had been democratic.
Ms Nambooze, who rose to prominence as an opposition politician based on her support for Mengo and the Kabaka, is one of those who got disenchanted by Mr Mayiga’s approach to his job as Katikkiro, particularly his de-politicisation of Mengo and the thawing of relations between Mengo and President Museveni.
Earlier, in 2007, Ms Nambooze was abducted by State operatives, together with Mr Mayiga, who was then the Kingdom spokesperson, and his then deputy Medard Sseggona.

The abduction of the trio and their detention at different places in Western Uganda came at a time Mengo and the government were locked in a disagreement over proposed amendments to the land law.
Whereas both Ms Nambooze and Mr Sseggona went into opposition politics, Mr Mayiga remained in the service of the Kabaka and shortly after his elevation to the office of Katikkiro in 2013 led a team to State House Entebbe to receive hundreds of land titles that the government returned to Buganda.
President Museveni also attended the first Kabaka’s coronation anniversary under Mr Mayiga’s term, held in Lubiri Mengo, and the Katikkiro declared that he would cooperate with whoever recognised Kabaka Mutebi’s status regardless of that person’s political or religious affiliation.

Katikkiro Mayiga has ordinarily not responded to individual critics, usually picking occasions on which to dress matters raised. The last such occasion was the sitting of the Buganda Lukiiko on May 8, 2017.
Before the Lukiiko sitting, Mr Mayiga had elaborated in a press statement that the mass titling initiative Buganda Land Board had embarked on “represents the Buganda Kingdom legislative organ’s (Lukiiko) resolution of 1994; to offer leases to all interested tenants on the Kingdom land.”

Mr Mayiga, to make the point that there is nothing unusual about offering leases on the Kabaka’s land, noted that the kingdom has been offering leases since the said Lukiiko resolution was passed 23 years ago, and that to-date up to 20,000 leases have been issued.
In addition, Mr Mayiga noted: “Even most of the land that was returned to the kingdom in the 2013 agreement between the Kabaka and the President of Uganda has leases inherited by BLB (Buganda Land Board) stretching up to 99 years. This therefore demonstrates that leases are not only issued by Buganda Kingdom but also other bodies like Uganda Land Commission, District Land Boards, KCCA, religious institutions and Private Mailo owners.”

Lease process

To secure a lease, a kibanja holder fills an application form and pays Shs 950,000 in survey fees, which during the Kyapa Mungalo drive has been reduced to Shs650,000. The applicant also pays an additional Shs250,000 as registration and inspection fees.
Buganda Land Board then sends an inspector to the location to authenticate the purchase documents for the kibanja and then submits a copy of his report to the parish chief, on to sub county and then to county level. At county level, the applicants are vetted by a committee that sits every month.
A Buganda Land Board branch manager in the county and officials from Buganda Kingdom’s local government sit on the committee. The approved applicant’s details are then forwarded to the Central Lease Committee of Buganda Land Board before the lease title is processed.

The value of the empty plot is then computed, Buganda Land Board officials say basing on the benchmarks set by the Chief Government Valuer, and once the value of the land is determined the applicant is then required to pay what is called a premium.

The premium is 10 per cent of the value of the land. If a plot is valued at Shs50m, for instance, the applicant will be required to pay Shs 5m (10 per cent of 50m) for the 49-year lease.
Then every year, the applicant will be required to pay a ground rent equivalent to 1 per cent of the value of the land, or 10 per cent of the premium. For the one whose plot’s estimated value is Shs50m, the annual payment will be Shs500,000 (1 per cent of 50m or 10 percent of 5m).
On the expiry of 49 years of the lease, the one occupying the lease, according to the agreement, has automatic right to renew it by paying a new premium based on the freshly estimated value of the land.

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