In 1997, amid great anticipation, the Basua were finally to be resettled through a project funded by the European Commission (EC) in Uganda. Here was a significant donor that seemingly had the wherewithal to oversee and manage such a sensitive project. It now appears that the organisation brought in by the EC to carry out the work, RWIDE, was not merely incompetent but also largely corrupt. RWIDE’s Director, Vincent Mubiru is now being investigated by police and an audit is been launched. Yet the question remains over how this organisation was chosen, and how they managed to secure funding for so long.

The Basua are a unique social and cultural group in Uganda. They are the direct descendants of the Efe ‘Pygmies’ in the Congo and therefore distinct from Batwa of Southern Uganda who originate from Rwanda and Burandi. This distinction may seem trivial, but the fact that they are consistently being referred to as Batwa by the media, by government officials and by the organisation resettling them speaks volumes for the ignorance and disdain that surrounds them. They are a heavily stigmatised people whose culture and lifestyle are openly mocked as “backward” by other Ugandans.

When the Ugandan Government drove the Basua out of the Semiliki Wildlife Reserve in the early 1990s as part of its internationally sanctioned efforts to preserve Ugandan wildlife, they effectively washed their hands of all responsibility. This, despite the World Bank’s insistence that all relocated groups be adequately housed and compensated.  Without land to cultivate and stripped of their hunting rights, the Basua were forced into a vagabond existence for over a decade.

By 2007, after failed efforts by organisations to resettle them, the Basua were placed in a makeshift campsite. It was then that RWIDE, an organisation located in another district that had no previous experience with forest dwellers, were awarded over €43,000 in funding from the EC to resettle them. With this money, they were to procure land, construct a settlement of 21 “semi-permanent” houses, build latrines and create a “cultural boma”, a building that would form the centre piece of the Basuas’ cultural performances for tourists.

When we arrived in September of this year, the project was clearly a mess. Of the 21 houses constructed, only 14 were still standing. The structures, composed of wood and cheap cement, looked battered and unfinished. Only one latrine had been built for the 90 residents. A crude foundation of concrete that was to become the cultural boma had already been “condemned” by the district engineer. What’s more, it was being erected far from the camp in a treeless area next to an electricity pole. The project’s office, complete with a gloriously ironic “Office of the King of the Batwa” sign, had been stripped of telephones, computers and filing cabinets. It was an empty shell in which two staff members sat behind two empty desks, awaiting tourists.

Yet in spite of this, RWIDE was to receive even more funding from the EC, this time to carry out a “cultural empowerment” project. Lacking any of the necessary experience or expertise in working with “forest people”, RWIDE were now being funded to provide them with education and training. Not surprisingly, this became more about assimilating them (or “sensitising”, as they call it) than protecting or promoting their cultural heritage. No experts were consulted, no impact assessments were carried out, and little effort was made to understand their unique worldview.  The reports that RWIDE were filing seemed to work however, and the European Commission were satisfied that their EU money was being well spent. According to Stan Frankland, the anthropologist working with the Basua, “the failure of the EU to adequately monitor a project that intends to transform the lives of such a fragile group is astonishing”.

It was while we were still in Uganda that evidence of financial mismanagement began to emerge. Frankland obtained budget documents and testimonies indicating that the head of RWIDE, Vincent Mubiru, profited greatly both from the procurement of the land and the misappropriation of building funds. It is estimated that some 3,200,000 Ug SH was pocketed from the land deal alone. Budgets obtained of building materials show a consistent difference in either price or quantity between the amount paid and the amount received. Mubiru was, as the Ugandan expression goes, “demanding his soda”.

As a result of Frankland’s investigation, the police have opened an inquiry into Mubiru’s dealings and the EC has agreed to carry out a full audit over the coming month  The story broke in the Ugandan Monitor and was more thoroughly investigated by New Vision, during which Mubiru even attempted to bribe the journalist. According to Frankland, in a report prepared for the EC, a sum of 250,000 Ug Sh was paid by Mubiru to the Basua to buy their silence. He has since fled.

The Basua’s main concern now is that the European Commission continue to fund them at this critical stage. They have established their own Community Based Organisation called the “Organisation for the Survival of the Batwa” (OSIBA), and are now looking to secure their basic food security and health care needs. It remains to be seen what the EC’s audit will uncover and whether they choose to fulfil their own responsibility . Our task now, as we begin to edit from over 26 hours of footage and interviews, is to ask how this could happen. How did such an unqualified project secure the funding to provide such an important programme, and why was nobody checking?

It’s a daunting task. Their situation is complex and undoubtedly fragile. While we were there, a number of events transpired that have made this a hugely important time in their history. This next year will be critical in how their future as a people will be shaped.

We’re determined that our documentary must play a role. Despite being a unique social and cultural group in Uganda, their situation has been mostly ignored. They remain at the bottom of the pile. We therefore feel a heavy responsibility in telling their story and lending it justice.

Just in the past few days, Edward Ndige (below, centre left), the oldest of the Basua men and one of the generation raised in the Semuliki forest, has died. Ndige was one of the more memorable characters we filmed, and with him a great deal of knowledge and personal history has been lost. His death has brought a level of urgency to the project.

Over the coming months we will be blogging about the process of documenting their story, of the many systems and players (the government, the wildlife authorities, the NGOs, their donors, and the media) that continue to shape the lives of the Basua.

We realise that we are only half-way there. Now begins an extensive process of sourcing archival footage, tracking anecdotes and piecing together all of the primary sources. We would gladly welcome any support that people could offer.

- A Robinson.

We’ll be flying into Kampala on the 6th of September and will spend the first week with the Basua in Western Uganda, near Bundibugyo in the Semliki valley, before returning to the capital to conduct interviews.

The response to the project has been very positive so far, though some are (rightly) concerned about how a documentary can actually help the Basua. There’s no easy answer to this. Our goal is to portray their current situation and make sense of it through historical reference.  In this, we are greatly helped by the trust that Stan Frankland has built up with them over a generation, and the insights he has gained.

It’s clear that the Basua are heavily stigmitised within Uganda due to taboos surrounding their life-style, their marijuana smoking, their perceived vagabond existence. What is more, unlike certain other pygmy groups who have developed a more acceptable approach to tourism, the Basua are also stigmitised by outsiders, by tourists themselves.

“I do still feel, as I did ten years earlier, that the nature of tourist visits to the Bambuti [Basua] veers uncomfortably close to reducing them to a freak show exhibit – look at the short people, shake their hand, snap a photograph and off we go.” – Bradt guide to Uganda, 2007

They are seen more as a problem than as a people, and we would hope, at the very least, to create a three dimensional portrait of their situation and let their story come through in their own words.  Ultimately, we would hope that this project might help shift the debate in Uganda towards greater recognition and understanding of the Basua.

photo by Amos Kahana

1. pygmy - A member of any of various peoples, especially of equatorial Africa and parts of southeast Asia, having an average height less than 5 feet.
2.  An individual of unusually small size.
3. An individual considered to be of little or no importance.

Pygmy is a portrait of a group of people who are considered the marginalised of the marginalised. It is also a story about tourism and aid, a study of attitudes and perceptions, and an examination of the myths that continue to shape our understanding of indigenous people.

The term “Pygmy” is as much a tourist brand name for “exotic forest dweller”, as it is imposed racial grouping of short people. It is a term inseparable from tourism, as Pygmies have been a popular tourism attraction almost from the moment they were “discovered”.

We began filming the documentary two years ago when Stan Frankland was visiting the Basua who live in western Uganda. A professor in St Andrew’s college, Stan has been studying the Basua for nearly twenty years and is writing a book on his insights. 

We were struck by the uniqueness of their situation. The Basua are considered among the most marginalized of pygmy groups, having suffered war and displacement, and being removed from forest resources. A tourist attraction for most of the 20th Century, the Basua have, to many people, become almost a picture postcard for the destructive power of “progress”. Alcoholism, violence and drug abuse have seen their stock among tourists deteriorate and they are now considered vagabonds, dependent on aid.

The Brandt Tourist Guide (1998) claims that their situation offers “a short, sharp lesson in the potential consequences of irresponsible cultural voyeurism”. The Lonely Planet (1997) sees them as an example of “another unique culture hitting the dust”.

However, as Stan writes, “the Basua have failed in their allotted role as tourist attraction because they have not been ‘Pygmy’ enough, their behaviour has not corresponded with tourist expectations”.

Pygmy will be investigating just how the Basua have been challenging the expectations, and the various ways they have been engaging with and responding to their circumstances.

We will be filming again in September and aim to have it completed by March of 2009. Please contact us for more information.