Uganda: E-protesting Ugandans resort to ICTs to save the forest

Highway Africa News Agency

The campaign to save Uganda's Mabira, one of the biggest natural forest reserves in central and eastern Africa has intensified with the opening of protest websites, blogs and usage of SMS and e-mail protest messages.

By early this week about 6 000 people had signed up to several Internet websites to protest government's intended giveaway of 7,100 hectares of forestland to sugar producing investors, referred to as SCOUL, for conversion into sugarcane plantation.

"We the undersigned do not believe that Mabira Forest should be de-gazetted Govrenment of Uganda in order to plan sugar cane," reads the appeal on www.savemabira.petition-time.com

While iblog in the UK says, "the not-so-sweet taste of sugar" other bloggers have run protest messages and discussion forums over the Internet syndicating messages such as, "An Inconvenient Truth - SAVE MABIRA FOREST", "Here is the Mabira conservation plea" and another classic, "sell of Mabira is madness."

Green Watch, an environmental NGO that also joined the campaign against the forest giveaway claimed it had by Monday this week sent out over 30,000 SMS to unique mobile SIM devices, according to one of its officials Kenneth Kakuru.

This means that more than 2 percent of the 2.3 million mobile phone subscribers in Uganda have received the protest SMS messages.

SMS is an acronym that refers to "short message service" application for mobile telephony and wireless personal digital devices referred to as PDAs.

"Save Mabira Forest. Do not buy Lugazi Sugar," read the SMS messages.

Government swung into action by ordering police to make all possible attempts to investigate the campaign in which anonymous individuals composed mobile phone, PDA short messages and e-mails calling for a boycott of SCOUL sugar.

Uganda's police spokesman Asan Kasigye told HANA that the hunt for the originator of the sugar-boycott messages was on because the boycott was an economic sabotage.

The impact of the SMS and e-protest campaign on the SCOUL sugar market hasn't yet been assessed.

Although SMS is a nearly 10-year-old technology that's been enormously popular in Europe and the US, sub-Sahara African countries have rolled out the service in earnest only in the past five years.

With only 2 percent of Africa's population enjoying access to the Internet and 50,000 new mobile subscribers everyday, Africans have moved to the usage of SMS technology as a way of embracing digital citizenship.

Ken Lohento of the Panos Institute of West Africa recently said, "Nigeria's 6 million mobile subscribers mobilize demonstrations by usage of SMS applications.

Ownership of the new Internet-based services such as blogs is on the upward trend and this enhances broad based access to voice on the continent.

According to a Frost and Sullivan study, SMS leads all wireless data services in its contribution to total telecom revenue.