Wanyoto Family Land Dispute Escalates, Prompting Police Intervention.

The chairperson of the Women’s League of the ruling National Resistance Movement (NRM) party, Ms Lydia Nambozo Wanyoto Mutende, has been reported to the police’s Criminal Investigations Department (CID) for allegedly issuing death threats to her younger brother as the two battle for control of their family land on the outskirts of Mbale City.

In his complaint to the CID on July 11, 2022, Mr. Paul Mugoya Wanyoto alleges that for the past three years, his elder sister, Ms. Lydia Nambozo Wanyoto Mutende, has been threatening him with death since he expressed his political interests in running on the Opposition Forum for Democratic Change (FDC) party ticket. He documented these threats in email correspondences, receiving no response from her.

Land Wrangles.

The dispute between the siblings intensified when Ms. Mutende, accompanied by her bodyguards, allegedly raided their ancestral home in Lumumba Cell, Nabweya Ward in Mbale City at 4 a.m. She began setting up a camp near her brother’s residence. Mr. Wanyoto, a Kampala-based High Court advocate and chairperson of Mbale City Land Board, has called for a police investigation into the matter.

Mr. Wanyoto’s concerns about Ms. Mutende’s heavy security deployment at their family residence date back to May 23, 2020. He expressed discomfort with the security presence, fearing it would jeopardize his political activities that were meant to take place at their family home. He suggested working with district security to ensure everyone’s safety.

Both siblings faced electoral defeats; Mr. Wanyoto contested for the Northern City Division MP seat on an FDC ticket, while Ms. Mutende lost her bid for the Mbale City Woman MP seat to a fellow NRM member, Ms. Connie Nakayenze Galiwango.

When asked about the alleged death threats, Ms. Mutende stated that she had not received the police complaint. She emphasized that she prefers not to handle family matters in the media, which has been built on respect over time.

Narrative dispute

In a previous comment, Ms. Mutende claimed she was fighting for the rights of her fellow sisters in their family home, accusing her younger brother of opposing her because she is a ‘girl-child.’ However, one of Ms. Mutende’s sisters, Ms. Barbra Wanyoto, refuted this assertion, stating that the fight was about security and competition, not gender. She clarified that Lydia had not consulted any of the sisters in her fight against their younger brother.

The Wanyoto family consists of 11 siblings, with Mr. Wanyoto being the youngest and Ms. Mutende being one of the middle children. Following a clan meeting, the police and clan elders advised the feuding siblings to attempt an amicable resolution of their differences.

Efforts to reach the police spokesperson, Mr. Fred Enanga, were unsuccessful. However, Mr. John Byamugisha, the DPC of Northern City Division, halted any further construction on the family land by Ms. Mutende and urged the family to resolve the issue.

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