By Emmanuel Olinga
KATAKWI
Women in the counties of Usuk and Ngariam in Katakwi district yesterday, March 10, 2025, protested over allegations that the state Minister for Education and Sports and Ngariam county MP diverted a tractor to his property.
His Excellency Yoweri Kaguta Museveni donated the tractor to the then-Usuk County Women’s Association on January 20th, 2015, with the intention of making agriculture easier and more productive in order to elevate single women, widows, and orphans out of poverty, but things turned out differently.
After a lengthy search and wait for the tractor’s return, dissatisfied women from the Women’s Association Usuk became impatient to reclaim their tractor from Minister Ogwang and instead protested after discovering their tractor had been impounded at Katakwi Central Police Station after having an accident.
A group of women protested on Katakwi streets, pleading with the authorities to return the tractor taken by Minister Ogwang.
A section of the Women’s Association Usuk County, that range from 80-100 single mothers, widows, and vulnerable women, say the president should direct Ogwang to return the tractor to disadvantaged women rather than an MP who earns a salary.
Loy Akori chairperson, Betty Isaasit, treasurer, Mary Gorreti Anyakoit secretary of the executive committee of the women’s association stated that they used the tractor for a short period of time before state minister Ogwang sent his campaign mobilizer Ogele Gabriel Abuderi to collect it from the treasurer’s home in Okocho Okulonyo Sub County.
Other members, including Teddy Opus, Natasha Prosy Akiteng, Oboliale, and Hellen Beatrice Adoa, stormed RDC’s offices seeking directions to President Museveni’s office regarding their complaint that Minister Ogwang snatched and took the tractor to his farm instead of the women’s association. The women’s association requested that the RDC intervenes in the matter by retrieving the tractor or addressing the matter to President Museveni.
Katakwi Traffic Office said that they impounded the tractor that was carrying manure due to the collision, but they received a call from Hon. Ogwang to release the tractor from the police yard.
Hon Ogwang Peter, when questioned by Deputy RDC Vincent Savior Okwi about the situation, said that the tractor was not his but had been picked up because it had been mismanaged, but he was willing to return it to the women.
