April 14, 2007 Uganda
promises Indians security, Indians still scared
Kampala/New Delhi
Two days after an Indian was killed by a mob protesting an Indian
sugar firm's plan to develop part of a protected rainforest, most
frightened Indians in the Ugandan capital Saturday stayed indoors
despite President Yoweri Museveni assuring them of their safety.
In New
Delhi, Minister of State for External Affairs Anand Sharma said
Saturday that India was keeping a close watch on the situation and
said that it has taken up the issue of Indians' safety with the
Ugandan government.
The body of Devang Rawal, who was stoned to death by rioters in
Kampala, is likely to be flown to his hometown Ahmedabad later
Saturday.
"Uganda Funeral Services is preparing the body to be flown to
India," said Rajni Taylor, who heads the Ugandan Indian
Association, adding that his employers were supervising the burial
arrangements.
Rawal was working as a sales representative with Translink (U) Ltd,
a company importing products of Johnson & Johnson and Nestle
products.
Officials from the Indian High Commission on Thursday evening
visited Mulago Hospital mortuary where the body of Rawal was being
kept.
"To attack, insult or damage the property of any Ugandan or
guests of Uganda is something the government will not
tolerate," Museveni said in a statement Friday.
"I want to assure Ugandans that such hooliganism will not be
allowed to happen again, and to warn those that do not want to
follow the law they will pay heavily," Museveni added.
Many Indian-owned shops were closed in Kampala and many Indians
decided to stay home and not send their children to school.
Knowing the sensitivity of such attacks and its possible impact on
the Ugandan economy in which Indians, mostly traders, play a key
role, the police swung into action and has identified those
responsible for rioting and looting that hit the city Thursday.
For Indians living there for generations, Thursday's mob attack that
included Indians being dragged off motorbikes and beaten, their
shops looted and a Hindu temple attacked, it was an eerie recall of
virulent anti-India bashing by former Ugandan dictator Idi Amin who
expelled nearly 75,000 Asians in 1972.
The rioting mob was protesting the move by The Sugar Corporation of
Uganda Limited (SCOUL), part of the Indian-owned Mehta group, to
expand its sugar estates by cutting the Mabira rain forest- one of
Uganda's last remaining patches of natural forest. It has been a
nature reserve since 1932.
Troops had to be deployed to control the situation, after police
failed to stop rioters attacking Asian businesses.
Shangu Patel of the Indian Association went around the city Friday
encouraging Asians to reopen their shops but his efforts were met
with scepticism, the online edition of New Vision reported.
"How can we be very sure that there will be no repeat?"
asked a local Indian shopkeeper.
The controversy began last year when the Ugandan government ordered
a study whether to cut down nearly a third of Mabira- one of
Uganda's last remaining patches of natural forest.
The government's proposal had angered many in the country who
alleged that the environmental costs of slashing the forest would
far exceed the economic benefits of the plantation.
Until 1972, Asians constituted the largest non-indigenous ethnic
group in Uganda.
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