Uganda's Bagungu people worried over oil activities' impact on sacred sites

Alex Wakitinti is worried about the sacred natural sites he tends in the large swath of bushy grassland near Lake Albert. It's the same slice of his homeland that oil companies are developing in order for Uganda to become an oil producer by 2026.

But French oil company TotalEnergies and others working toward that goal are recklessly ignoring the significance of Wakitinti's spiritual work, he said, as well as that of the other custodians minding hallowed natural sites in the remote district of Buliisa near the Congo border.

"According to the programme of Total, custodians are not there," said Wakitinti, chief custodian of sacred sites in Buliisa. “We are not in their programme.”

As TotalEnergies invests billions into oilfield development and acquires more and more land, Wakitinti and other Bagungu people who practice traditional beliefs worry the spiritual power of at least 32 sacred natural sites in Buliisa keeps deteriorating.

A legal challenge: The Paris Climate Accord

Uganda is estimated to have recoverable oil reserves of at least 1.4 billion barrels, and officials see future oil earnings lifting millions out of poverty. Investors from Australia, Ireland, China and, most recently, France have been involved over the years.

TotalEnergies — the top shareholder in Uganda's oil project — faces a legal challenge and pressure to pull out because of concerns over a heated pipeline that campaigners say undermines The Paris Climate Accord.

In 2006, a commercially viable amount of oil was discovered in Buliisa, which is home to less than 100,000 Bagungu, a community of farmers and others who depend on the Albertine area for everything from food to religious practice.

Their traditional beliefs are seen as peculiar in this Christian-majority country of 45 million people, contributing to the sense of injustice that’s now driving a campaign to protect their sacred natural sites from oil activities.

While the sites remain largely intact, the sanctity of two has been violated by a nearby pipeline and a processing facility. Excessive noise from oil-related work is believed to anger spirits, he said.

“We fault the oil companies because they have taken their roads and infrastructure through the sacred natural sites," he said.

In 2020, Irish firm Tullow Oil completed the $575M sale of its Ugandan assets to TotalEnergies, raising hopes of oil production after delays due to corruption scandals and tax disputes. But the French company faces challenges as some campaigners go to court and others urge banks to withdraw support.

European lawmakers last year passed a resolution that urged TotalEnergies to suspend its activities in the region. This year, the company faced a second lawsuit in Paris over its East Africa project.

Filed in June by French and Ugandan civic groups, the lawsuit accuses the company of failing to comply with France's “duty of vigilance” law and seeks compensation for six years of alleged land and food rights violations.

TotalEnergies has long denied the charges, saying it’s deploying state-of-the-art design — including horizontal drilling — to minimize ecological damage.

Human Rights Watch last month published a report that warned of a looming disaster, asserting that households affected by land acquisitions are worse off than they had been. “The land acquisition process has been marred by delays, poor communication, and inadequate compensation,” that report said.

“The discovery of oil and gas found people when they were not prepared for the industry. These are people who did not know the potential impacts that come along,” said Tibasiima, a Mugungu raised in Buliisa.

“Had they known earlier, probably, maybe, they could have developed their local means of preserving the environment in general, including protection of their sacred sites.”

Custodians of sacred sites were not able to predict the impact of compulsory land acquisitions, especially with oil contractors withholding information about project pathways to keep compensation costs down.

Now some authorities regard the Bagungu’s concern over sacred sites as a nuisance that could only delay the start of oil production, he said.