Thursday, November 9th, 2023 | By
Fishing communities along Lake Albert in Hoima district in Western Uganda are demanding for more police posts to curb lawlessness in the area.
In their petition dated 23rd October 2023, and addressed to Hoima Police Commander and the Resident District Commissioner (representative of the president in the district), the residents throughKaiso Women’s Group; a registered community based organization located in Kaiso fishing village, Kabale sub county Hoima raised concern that lack of police posts along the lake has increased underreported gender based violence cases.
According to the petitioners, Hoima district has only one police post along Lake Albert located in Kaiso fishing village that handles cases from other fishing villages of Kyehorro, Tonya, Mbegu Manok, Mbegu Madit, Nana, Fofo, Hoimo and Kijangi.
They noted that the next police post is located in Ssebigoro landing site in Kikuube district while another is in Kabaale Sub County which they say are all very far.
Ms.Sylvia Kemigisa, the group chairperson noted that the group established a community safe space with the help of National Association of Professional Environmentalists (NAPE) in 2021. The safe space is handling cases of gender based violence through mediation, counseling and referral to police by trained community based care takers.
However, the safe spaces are receiving overwhelming numbers from the villages mentioned.
“Some of the victims say the long distance to the police post, congestion at the only available police post which is causing lack of privacy and delayed solving of cases affect them from reporting the cases to the police post,” she said.
The petitioners request for more police posts or work with communities to open up more safe spaces.
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