How conservation pressure, corruption, and neglect are crushing youth hope
Kapchorwa Municipality is often presented as a growing urban center—a symbol of progress in Sebei. But beneath this image lies a painful reality for young people. For many youth across its divisions and wards, life is defined not by opportunity, but by fear, exclusion, and quiet suffering.
In Kapchorwa Municipality, young people are surrounded by government offices, institutions, and promises of development. Yet development rarely reaches them. What exists on paper does not translate into dignity, safety, or livelihoods. Instead, youth are trapped between brutality, corruption, unemployment, and abandonment.
Uganda Wildlife Authority (UWA) Brutality and Land Grabbing
In Kwoti and West Division areas—particularly Tegeres Wars and Kapengura Wards—youth face ongoing brutality and land grabbing linked to the Uganda Wildlife Authority (UWA).
Young people speak of intimidation, violent enforcement, and loss of ancestral and community land without proper consultation or compensation. Homes, gardens, and grazing areas have been affected, leaving youth displaced and stripped of their economic foundation. What was once land for survival and inheritance has become a source of fear.
For many youth, UWA is no longer seen as a conservation partner but as a force that uses power to silence communities. The trauma of evictions, beatings, and threats has left deep psychological scars, breeding anger, helplessness, and a sense that the law protects institutions not people.
Corruption, Nepotism, and Sale of Public Jobs
Corruption in Kapchorwa District has become an open wound for young people.
Jobs are not given based on merit, qualifications, or commitment. Instead, youth say recruitment depends on “who your father is” or which official you are connected to. Many positions are allegedly reserved for relatives and close associates of those in power, particularly linked to the district service commission.
More disturbing are widespread allegations that public jobs are sold for amounts reaching up to 70 million shillings. For ordinary youth—unemployed, struggling, and desperate—this is an impossible barrier. Qualified young people are locked out, mocked by a system that rewards money and bloodlines over fairness and competence.
This corruption has destroyed trust in institutions and convinced many youth that honesty and education no longer matter.
Karamojong Cattle Raids and Youth Insecurity
In the lower areas of West Division—Kutung, Kabat, Kaplelko, Tuban, Kapnyikew, and surrounding communities—Karamojong cattle raids remain a constant threat.
Youth live under fear of night attacks, loss of livestock, and violence. For families that depend on cattle for survival, these raids are economically devastating. Young people are forced into guarding roles instead of education or work, while others are drawn into cycles of revenge and insecurity.
The lack of effective protection and response has left youth feeling abandoned, forced to survive in conditions where safety is never guaranteed and the government has never to compensate us like other regions.
Collapsing Road Infrastructure and Theft of Public Funds
Kapchorwa Municipality receives approximately one billion shillings annually from the central government for road construction and maintenance. Yet across the municipality, road conditions tell a different story.
Roads remain impassable, poorly maintained, or completely abandoned. Youth question where this money goes, as visible development is absent. The common belief is that these funds end up in private pockets instead of public roads.
Poor roads cut off youth from markets, jobs, schools, and health services. They deepen isolation, increase transport costs, and reinforce poverty—while officials continue to speak of progress that young people cannot see or use.
Unemployment, Drugs, and Alcoholism
Unemployment in Kapchorwa Municipality has reached alarming levels. With no jobs, no capital, and no meaningful support, many young people have lost hope.
To numb frustration and pretend they are coping, youth increasingly turn to drugs and alcoholism. Substance abuse has become a survival mechanism—a way to escape reality rather than confront it. What looks like enjoyment is often deep despair, masked by intoxication.
This crisis is not a moral failure of youth. It is the outcome of prolonged neglect, exclusion, and broken systems that offer no alternatives.
Government Programs That Exist Only on Paper
Government support for youth in Kapchorwa Municipality largely exists on paper.
Programs like the Parish Development Model (PDM) are publicly celebrated, yet youth report that they do not benefit. Access is blocked by corruption, favoritism, and demands for large bribes. Concerned officials allegedly ask for money before processing youth applications, shutting out those who need support most.
As a result, youth are left watching announcements on radio and television about programs that never reach them—deepening cynicism and anger toward government promises.
Kapchorwa’s youth are not lazy, criminal, or hopeless.
They are pushed to the edge by systems that exclude them.
They are asking for justice, dignity, and a future where effort is rewarded—not sold to the highest bidder.
