KAMPALA – Mr. Leandro Komakech, the former Gulu Municipality Member of Parliament says it’s time to review the East African Community (EAC) treaty to conform to modern-day changes.
The current EAC was established nearly 25 years ago with a three-member bloc, comprising Kenya, Uganda, and Tanzania, but has since grown to seven members.
The countries that have joined the regional bloc after its founding are Rwanda, Burundi, South Sudan, and the Democratic Republic of Congo.
Delivering a public lecture at Victoria University recently, Mr. Komakech, also a Senior Research and Advocacy Officer on Traditional Justice, Human Rights, and Transitional Justice issues at both National and International Levels said local integration ought to cater for concerns affecting refugees.
He explained the lacuna in the 1961 convention for refugees especially on the silence on the nature of voluntary repatriation, which has led to a series of forced repatriations especially in Rwanda, Uganda, and Tanzania.
He reasoned the concept of local integration, revealing that under the current arrangement, refugees have no legal integration despite the security and political volatility in most of the Great Lakes Region countries.
He cited examples where Uganda has deported an estimated 3,000 Rwandan nationals who had been living in the country since at least 2003.
Most of those deported are said to be victims who fled their country after the 1994 genocide. The group never achieved official refugee status, either in Uganda or in Tanzania, where they spent several years before being expelled.
Uganda rejects accusations it had flouted international norms by forcibly repatriating Rwandan refugees saying most of those sent home are failed asylum seekers.
Uganda hosts about 11,300 Rwandan refugees. Thousands of people fled Rwanda after the 1994 genocide in which 800,000 ethnic Tutsi and Hutu were killed.
Komakech said there clear lack of political will to openly discuss the implementation of local integration as one of the durable solutions.
The Dean of the Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences, Dr. Harriet Mimi Uwineza, who is the host of these lecture series encouraged students to network with practitioners in areas of their studies and thanked Mr. Komakech for the opportunity given to students to be enlightened.
Considering that the lecture was attended by students from different departments like International Relations, public administration, education, social work and social sciences, development studies, and law; she highlighted the centrality of forced migration as an area of study and encouraged those planning to do their research in that area to utilize the opportunities that the faculty provides for linking up with experts like Komakech, in order to find job placements and employment opportunities.
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