Eerily quiet border

Today Sal and I travelled from Kigali in Rwanda to Kabale in the very South f Uganda. I have done this journey. before and much of it was very familiar; lots of steep valley sides, mostly wooded, and a very flat, wide valley floor, first of all planted with rice but, as we gained height towards the border, replaced by tea.

Local people clearly make the most of the fertile alluvial soils on the valley floor. People were picking tea and along the road there were also people carrying sacks full of the leaves. They, and those carrying milk churns on bicycles, were particularly noticeable today as the road was completely empty of any other traffic at all. This is the main road between Uganda and Rwanda and its normally full of lorries travelling huge distances across Africa – but not at present.

About four months ago President Kagame of Rwanda closed the border here. He did this because he claims that dissidents from Rwanda had been regrouping in Uganda and encouraging other Rwandans to join their cause. Now Rwandans are not allowed to cross the border at all and Ugandans are choosing not to go to Rwanda either. This is having an enormous impact on those communities who live near the border and those businesses who depend on border trade. We traveled in a car belonging to the Cross Country company who take people to and Uganda and. Now they have no customers apart from people like us who are not subject to the closure. Their fleet of cars sits forlornly in the bus station in Kigali – no travellers, no trade, no income.

When you get to a border such as this it is usually a really iconic scene. It is hugely busy with coaches, lorries, large numbers if people, hanging around and queuing to get visas and have passports checked; lots of goats and the odd cow, lots of local trying to sell you things, change your money, beggars asking for help, police looking either officious or even downright threatening. It is in short a colourful, chaotic and vibrant scene. There are mothers trying to control their wayward children, people trying to organise their luggage and endless checks of buses and trucks in both directions.

Today the border is not like that at all. We saw one bus and no lorries, no queues of people waiting and the only policeman on the Ugandan side was studiously reading a paper whilst half reclining on his chair. Most people in the vicinity looked resigned to boredom but they must also be desperate as their means of livelihood has all but been removed. There are no people to buy food, change money or purchase all their goods. It was a sorry sight.

Who knows how quickly this situation can be resolved? Rwandans largely believe the government’s view that some Rwandans who travel to Uganda have been being coerced into joining rebel groups or even tortured. Ugandans do not believe any if this and blame Rwanda. They choose not to travel to Rwanda. The respective presidents met recently with the president of Angola acting as a mediator and there was a claim that the issue had been resolved but that is not as it appears on the ground.

Meanwhile ordinary people on both sides if the border suffer.

Sal and I quickly acquired the necessary stamps in our passports and were waved through past the very British road sign saying ‘Keep Left’ (Rwanda was originally a Belgian colony and so drives on the right). Very quickly we arrived in Kabale and had lunch with our great friend, Diana, and the on to Lake Bunyonyi in the quiet late afternoon light.. just as we turned the corner to see the lake the sun broke through the high cloud and glinted in the trees. It was a beautiful evening in which to travel by boat to Itambira, the small island where Sal now lives for almost half of every year in the tourist lodge called Itambira Seeds of Hope. It feels like arriving home, even for me. We are warmly greeted by the team here and I can settle into my little tree house on the lake shore – home for the next wee