Total E& P strengthens ties with the community through Sports.

Total E&P Uganda, has launched its first ever mini football league in Nwoya district with eight (8) football teams from Purongo and Got-Apwoyo sub-counties competing for a Total trophy and other prizes.

Nwoya district chairman, Patrick Okello Oryema yesterday flagged-off the mini-football league that will be played until June 25th, 2016 at Purongo and Paraa primary school play grounds in Purongo Sub County with a call for friendship and a peaceful co-existence between the community and the oil company.

The winning team will receive a trophy and a bull while the rest of the participating teams will also benefit from other various prizes.

Total E&P Uganda Public Relations Officer Christopher Ocowun says Nwoya District is key to their operations since it hosts the resources that the company is developing in the Murchison Falls National National Park.

He adds that Total is using sports as an opportunity to promote activities that enable the company to continuously interact and live in harmony with the people of Nwoya.

According to Ocowun, Total prepared the fields for the games, through the installation of new football goal posts to the host schools and provided the players with kits for the matches.

The participating teams include; Wii Anaka FC, Patira FC, Protouch FC, Got Ngur FC, Bel Kec FC, Super Villa FC, The Crane FC and Lion Power FC. The eight participating teams were selected by Nwoya District Football Association after playing qualifier matches organized by the district football association for more than 20 teams. The matches will be presided over by referees selected from within the community.

Compensation policy of Total E&P Uganda

Is the community aware of this policy? Follow me on this quest to hear from the locals in Purongo on this policy;

To be able to perform its exploration activities, Total E&P Uganda leases land from owners and is required to compensate them for damaged items (structure, crops, trees or plants). The compensation process is based on rates set by the district land board, validated the CGV.

Total does not acquire land. The land acquisition process is managed through the government and the District Land Board(s), in cooperation with the relevant national authority. Land is currently leased or rented with guidance from the Government and in accordance to Uganda land laws. Rental dues paid to land owners are based on the going market values of land in specific areas.

Compensation rates are set by the Government of Uganda through the District Land Boards. This is overseen by the Chief Government Valuer’s office at National level. The District determines rates annually to set the correct value of compensation owed to claimants. There is a full range of rates applicable depending on the crop, how mature it is and its size (acres, meter square and per plant). In addition to these rates, the CGV applies a 30% disturbance allowance.

These rates are issued publicly by the District Land Board. There are clear guidelines which are followed before the compensation is done, viz:
Total E&P tries to ensure that the compensation process is done within reasonable time and smoothly.

Oil Waste Management by Total E&P Uganda (Nwoya/Buliisa)

Waste management is regulated by the Government of Uganda through the National Environment and Management Authority (NEMA) which sets waste management standards.

Therefore in line with that Management of oil waste, i.e. storage and/or transportation conditions and final treatment and/or disposal of waste, varies according to the types of waste that are generated. After segregation on site (camps, drilling rigs, etc.), waste (except drilling waste) are transported by a licensed contractor and delivered to other licensed contractors, some of them for recycling (glass, plastic, batteries, drums…), other for treatment (sewage sludge…) or incineration (medical waste…).

In a press release yesterday, Total E&P Uganda says that it is in their policy to check the licensing status of the contractors used, to check the license to make sure that it is valid and appropriate for the types of wastes to be managed. These contractors are also periodically audited.

According to a  report released by Government Chemists in government Laboratory located in Wandegeya, Kampala  in August 2013 about the suspected harmful Oil wastes in Purongo and the report indicated that the oil wastes were not hazardous to human life. Richard Todwong, Minister without portfolio confirmed that the results.

 

 

MONEY TALK

My OIL
Our oil
We shall be rich
I shall be rich
Says who?
The money talk
Talking about my oil money in our oil area
That is not for you to spend time on,
Talk about other issues
Development,
Yes, development.

My oil
Our oil
Hey, where is the exact location?
In our village
My village?
Ha, my children
The youth
What qualification
Primary, but was universal
Secondary, universal too
What now,
My oil
Our oil
Hey foreigner
Here we are
Talk to me in my oil village
Your tongue is foreign
Your terms are foreign
Who can make me listen and hear you well
For the words of a foreigner is a word and a twist
In my oil village.

Don’t you see our sons
are unemployed
don’t you see our roads
Schools, hospital, medical care
The governed and the government,
The eye, ear, nose ,mouth
Of this blessed nation
Of my oil village
Told me no nothing
That I could understand

My neighbor whispered in my eyes
I saw with my ears,
My village is now a scramble palace
For the money talk.
My fathers’ fore fathers warned us
They told us that this village is our
The land is our to tilt
In peace not pieces
Without a tear, bloodshed, spears and arrows
But I see doom,
My oil village cries in pain,
For the feet that walk past are
Unclean, Hungry to feast on as many acres
Of what our fore fathers
Treasured
Come my son

My oil,
Our oil seems to be there
Where you see them shielding
with iron logs so tall can touch the sky
But what is that, …
Mama, don’t waste your saliva
Watching is all you have done
The head moves the tail, remember
The tail may move but in vain
Nobody moves
Let’s trade to Jowa’s papyrus chamber
As a local councillor,
Knowledge of such rests at his majestic door
Of our oil village

OIL IN UGANDA,WHOSAID WHAT

“Stop parliament giving oil to an individual [the minister in charge of petroleum],” runs the headline of a statement issued by a consortium of Ugandan NGOs and civil society alliances.
BUT WHAT DID SOME INDIVIDUALS SAY
Bugweri MP, Abdu Katuntu
“Let us not show the country that we are voting machines.” “We need to stand up and be counted, we must vote by roll-call,” he challenged the House. “Oil is the only strategic resource we have.”
Hon. Medard Ssegona
“We shall think again, convince our colleagues to drop the recommital. Under no circumstances shall it go on. They have developed mob justice but we have a strategy.”
Beatrice, a member of Kwatanza Women’s Farmers Group in Hoima District’s Buseruka sub-county, where the government plans to build an oil refinery.
“It is going to displace some people and we are worried that if the law is not fairly put our people may not be fairly compensated” she told Oil in Uganda.
“I came because there is a very important law that is going to be passed and I want to see, me a Munyoro woman, how am I going to benefit. I wanted to enter into parliament because I know it is my right as a Ugandan to go into the gallery and listen to whatever is taking place but to my shock I’ve been stopped from the gate [told] that I am not supposed to enter, that I was supposed to have got prior notice.”
EXTRACT FROM OIL IN UGANDA

THE TALK ON OIL IN UGANDA

According to The Ministry of Energy and Mineral Development, Investment in the country’s oil and gas sector which is now over US $ 1.5 billion. The companies currently licensed in the country are Tullow Oil, Total E&P, China National Offshore Oil
Corporation (CNOOC) and Dominion Petroleum.Acquisition of geoscientific data which includes over 7,194 line Kms of two dimensional and 1,608 km2 of three dimensional seismic data; geological mapping of over 10,000 km2 for petroleum exploration; 7,500 line km of gravity and magnetic data; 9,578 line km of aeromagnetic data and drilling of 77 wells.

The Ministry of Energy and Mineral Development appreciates the support of all stakeholders in taking forward the oil and gas sector to achieve the goal of the National Oil and Gas Policy, which is

“To use the country’s oil and gas resources to contribute to early achievement of poverty eradication and create lasting value to society.”

President Yoweri Museveni’s senior media advisor John Nagenda on oil debate;
“I say, without any doubt, that it would be calamitous for this country to have a single individual decide what happens in the field of oil, including giving licences and revoking them.”
“The shame of it, as no doubt some fear, that they might trample her and (worse) her mace. By a side-door she left the rowdy MPs to it,” Nagenda said, adding:

“I say, without any doubt, that it would be calamitous for this country to have a single individual decide what happens in the field of oil, including giving licences and revoking them.”

MAINSTREAMING OF GENDER ISSUES IN THE OIL SECTOR

The discovery of vast oil reserves of about 3.5 billion barrels in the Albertine Graben of Uganda has caused excitement across the country and more than a touch of anxiety too.
Mainstreaming of gender issues in the oil sector, particularly with regard to employment, training and compensation programmes are some of the clouds that surround participation of Ugandans in the sector.
Prof.Jackson Mwakali of Makerere University yesterday during a training of journalists from the Albertine region from the African Centre for Media Excellence, ACME, in kampala revealed that opportunities exist for both men and women to have equal opportunities for trainings to enhance their skills and any other jobs that exist in the oil sector.
.Prof. Mwakali adds that Makerere University has recommended that the government puts in place facilities that can enable Uganda to train its own people to work in the sector from the country.This will also give chance to women with family responsibilities to study since families in some communities like Kabaale are extended and Women bear the burden of up-bringing children.
Currently, oil trainings are offered at Makerere University in Kampala and Kigumba Petroleum Institute in Kiryandongo district to build the skills and capacity of Ugandans to be able to offer skilled labour in the oil sector.
He further says that women have a key role to play in the sector either directly or indirectly since they contribute to most productivity in the economy. Women MPs early this year demand¬ed a 40% representation on the board of the Petroleum Authority of Uganda. The women MPs also de¬manded for gender equity in employment and training in the oil sector.
However, Henry Bazira, Chairman Civil Society Coalition on Oil and Gas argues that there is a different way to involve even the grassroot woman and man has a voice through having citizen assemblies that are already on going in some areas in Bulisa district.
Bazira further says that every Ugandan has the capacity to influence policies and laws only that they do not always have the information they require. He acknowledges that gender is a very sensitive issue in any sector of the economic for development and fair play in the country.
PEPD Commissioner Ernest Rubondo says that what should not be forgotten is the community
content principle to motivate the vulnerable/affected communities.
The Petroleum (Exploration, Development and Protection) Bill, 2012 stipulates that the board shall consist of seven members of high moral char¬acter and proven integrity and competence appointed by the petroleum activities minister.