The Chinese contractor has said it cannot start work on Kalanki-Maharajgunj section until the electricity poles are removed. The work is already delayed by a year.

The second phase of Ring Road widening work involving the 8.2 km Kalanki-Maharajgunj section is still in limbo as the high-voltage power lines in the Samakhusi area have yet to be shifted.

The Department of Roads blames the Nepal Electricity Authority for the delay.

When a small group of armed insurgents in cars arrived in a village in the Wakhan Corridor, it put a sharp focus on Beijing’s role in this nation shattered by more than four decades of war.

Main photo: A Kyrgyz family in the Wakhan Corridor, a narrow strip of land that connects Afghanistan to China. CREDIT: MARTA PASCUAL JUANOLA

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Land grabs facilitated by multinational corporations, foreign investors and local governments in a pursuit for agribusiness have been escalating during the last decade. Huge acquisitions of farmland have led to violent displacements of rural populations. Although reports of the practice are not as recurrent in the media, the problem is far from over.

The European Investment Bank has large investments in Nepal, with four projects in its energy sector, but has done little to stop rights violations. 

Kiryandongo – Uganda – A team of police detectives attached to the Land Protection Unit, the Special Investigations Unit (SIU), and the Criminal Intelligence and Investigation Directorate (CIID) have arrested a senior lands officer, Kiryandongo District Land Board for land fraud that caused a forced displacement of thousands of natives off their land.

The government has been paying billions of shillings in compensation for its own land in questionable payouts by the National Lands Commission.

The compensation, which involves the acquisition of land for public utilities, is allegedly a cash cow for well-connected individuals who fleece taxpayers.

Two years ago, the government spent Sh1.5 billion of taxpayers’ money to acquire the Ruaraka land that later turned out to belong to the public.

AN agribusiness company, Jatu Public Limited Company is planning to raise 7.5bn/- through an initial share offer due this year with a target to invest in irrigation farming in various crops including maize and sunflower.

Jatu Plc which will sell 15 million ordinary share when its IPO starts in mid July and ends at the
end of the same month this year, has already secured 5,000 acres of land in Kiteto district of
Manyara region where it plans to cultivate maize and sunflower.

Opondo Cathy, (not real name due to the sensitivity of the matter), has never owned even a small radio in her entire life. This is a clear indication that the villager may not be aware of critical developments in the country. And this does not come as a shock, since the first time she heard the news of the COVID-19 in Uganda was when she visited her neighbor who’s 500 meters away from her home, barely a month after Uganda had even registered a first case COVID-19.

The government has embarked on fresh negotiations with land owners in Amuru District to secure land for the establishment of a Shs70 billion irrigation scheme.

On Monday, Ms Brenda Akao, the spokesperson of the Water and Environment ministry, said their officials are in Amuru trying to secure land for constructing the facility meant to boost farming in the district.