Residents Accuse Prime Minister’s Husband’s For His Plans to Develop in a Community Road

By Our Correspondent | Mayuge

Residents in Mayuge are collecting signatures against a businessman Hajji Dauda Isanga who is the
husband to the Third Deputy Prime Minister Rukia Isanga Nakadama who’s plans to close a community
road is in high gear protesting that the road provides access to homes, water sources and neighbouring
villages.

According to sources, Hajji Isanga intends to close a road passing through the area to facilitate
development on the land where some residents have also accused local leaders of supporting the
proposed closure, although the leaders described the allegations as baseless.

Reports also have it that residents have started collecting signatures to petition Mayuge Town Council,
saying the road is an important access route to their homes, water sources and neighbouring villages. The LC1 chairperson for Dwaliro Zone Vicent Ogwara said he was surprised when Isanga contacted him
and asked him to mobilise residents for a meeting to discuss the proposed closure of the said road for
his own benefits.

“Hajji Dauda Isanga came to my office so that i can help him mobilize residents over his interests in
closing the road but i rejected and instead started Mobilizing against it”, Ogwara said. While interviewing residents at random, the majority subsequently asked the businessman to meet
them and explain the proposal though the project seems to have died at birth.

“We love and support development but we can not accept a project that is restricting access to their
homes, neighbouring villages and essential services like water wells”, Nankwaga Annet one of the
residents emphasized.

The residents questioned why the road would be targeted for closure when it serves a large number of
people. They have now started collecting signatures that they intend to submit to Mayuge Town Council as part of their opposition to the proposal.

Latif Sonai the area councillor representing Kasugu ward, said the matter had previously been
considered by the council’s executive committee which had initially supported the proposal, but when
the matter was presented to the full council, the request was unanimously dropped.

The councillors said they were therefore surprised that the businessman had subsequently taken the
matter to residents. Mayuge Town Clerk Ibrahim Waiswa dismissed allegations that council officials were working with the
businessman to close the road adding that by the time he assumed office of the toen clerk, he found the
request already pending approval by council. “Council has not yet granted Isanga permission to close the road awaiting council approval”, Waiswa said.

The road forms part of the town’s physical development plan, meaning any proposal to alter its status
would have to go through the required planning and consultation procedures. Residents insisted that the road has existed since the early physical planning of Mayuge and has
remained an important access route since the area was elevated to town status more than two decades
ago.

Efforts to get a comment from Hajji Isanga went futile after he declined to comment when contacted by
phone.