The February 2008 UN humanitarian brief for Uganda reports that although security continues to improve in the north, over 1.15 million people remain displaced in camps and transit sites, primarily in the Acholi region. The brief cites lack of thatching grass, inadequate basic services in return areas, personal insecurity and landmines/UXOs as reasons for the slow rate of return. Some IDPs appear to be under pressure from landlords and local authorities to leave the camps, a violation of the principle of voluntary return. Gender-based violence also remains of particular concern, with Gulu and Amuru districts reporting an increase in recorded incidents during February. Read the full brief here.

The UN’s World Food Programme has announced plans to cut relief food aid to 600,000 people in Lango and Teso regions of northern Uganda. The food agency said that the humanitarian community is transitioning from distributing emergency relief supplies to implementing early recovery projects. The two regions have experienced increased security since the Juba peace talks began in 2006, and nearly 99% of IDPs in Lango have returned home, while 115,000 people remain displaced in Teso. However, so far the humanitarian community has been slow to transition from emergency relief to early recovery in the region – last year mortality and malnutrition rates in Lango increased due to a lack of basic services in areas where people returned home. Read more at The New Vision, and also read more here about how rising food prices may force the WFP to scale back its global operations.

Kenny Ferenchak, Resolve Uganda's field researcher in northern Uganda, reflects on the issues of land, community leadership, conflict resolution, and ethnicity in northern Uganda as displaced persons begin returning to their homes.

It seemed like a winning situation for everyone. The public market hadn’t been functioning for more than a decade because of the terrible war. By helping to construct permanent stalls, international agencies had found an ideal intervention for rehabilitating community infrastructure. The market would immediately benefit the population on the long path to recovery and would remain to provide economic opportunities long after the IDP camps have been abandoned. Everyone present at the community meeting verified the benefit the market would deliver, and local leaders and landowners assured agency representatives that the plans had the blessings of all involved.

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Amuru district in northern Uganda usually escapes the media attention that its more famous neighbor, Gulu, seems to attract. However, in recent months several large scale investment projects in the region have shifted the spotlight (somewhat) to Amuru. Two oil firms recently announced plans to continue oil exploration in northeastern and northern Uganda in preparation for preliminary drilling in the region later this year. The area slated for oil exploration includes parts of Amuru, which is also the proposed locale of a controversial sugarcane plantation. Though there is widespread support for recovery and investment initiatives in Amuru, weak state land institutions, widespread suspicion of Ugandan government land policies, and the reality that most people remain displaced and separated from their land make such investment proposals very sensitive.

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