New Oil, Same Business? at a Crossroads to Avert Catastrophe in Uganda ACRONYMS
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New Oil, Same Business? At a Crossroads to Avert Catastrophe in Uganda Community-Based Human Rights Impact Assessment of the Lake Albert Oil Extraction Project and Related Developments in the Albertine Graben, Uganda September 2020 / N° 757a Cover picture: A road to Lake Albert shores, where the Kingfisher oil wells are based. © Martin Dudek TABLE OF CONTENTS ACRONYMS 5 I. INTRODUCTION 6 1. The Local and National Context of this Human Rights Impact Assessment of the Lake Albert Oil Extraction Project 7 1.1. Local context in the Albertine Region 7 1.2. A complex political and economic situation in Uganda 8 2. Methodology 10 2.1. Brief presentation of the methodology: its reach and its limits 10 2.2. A rights-based approach 12 II. THE LAKE ALBERT OIL EXTRACTION PROJECT AND RELATED DEVELOPMENTS 14 1. Overview of the extraction project 14 2. The main companies involved 18 2.1. Total 20 2.2. China National Offshore Oil Corporation (CNOOC) 21 2.3. Tullow Oil 24 2.4. Atacama 25 2.5. EnviroServ Uganda 26 2.6. Albertine Graben Refinery Consortium 27 2.7. Uganda National Oil Company 27 3. Timeline of Oil Development in the Lake Albert Region 28 4. Legal actions initiated against the project 29 III. ASSESSING RESPECT FOR HUMAN AND ENVIRONMENTAL RIGHTS: FINDINGS AND ATTRIBUTION OF RESPONSIBILITY 30 1. Human Rights Defenders: Violence, harassment, and impunity in the Albertine Region 30 1.1. Violence and harassment against human rights defenders 34 1.2. Shrinking space and increased bureaucracy 39 1.3. A generalized environment of impunity 42 2. The right to land 45 2.1. Land: A collective right beyond property 45 2.2. Impacts on the right to land: Flawed processes and inadequate redress 52 2.3. Who is responsible for the impacts on the right to land? 70 3. The right to an adequate standard of living 73 3.1. Adequate standard of living: A multidimensional right 73 3.2. Housing, livelihoods and social networks disrupted 76 3.3. Who is responsible for the impacts on communities’ adequate standard of living? 92 4. The right to a healthy environment, water, and health 93 4.1. Legal framework on the rights to a healthy environment, water and health 93 4.2. The impacts of exploration and construction activities on the life and health of local populations 101 4.3. A major underestimation of environmental risks 119 4.4. Who is responsible for the impacts on the right to a healthy environment, water and health? 122 IV. GENERAL CONCLUSION AND RECOMMENDATIONS 124 1. General Conclusion 124 2. Recommendations 126 2.1. On the Protection of Human Rights Defenders 126 2.2. On the Right to Land 128 2.3. On the Right to an Adequate Standard of Living 132 2.4. On the Rights to a Healthy Environment, Water and Health 133 4 FIDH/FHRI - New Oil, Same Business? At a Crossroads to Avert Catastrophe in Uganda ACRONYMS AAAS American Association for the Advancement of Science CESCR Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights CPF Central Processing Facility CSOs Civil Society Organizations DNMC District Non-Governmental Monitoring Committee EACOP East African Crude Oil Pipeline ESIA Environmental and Social Impact Assessment FEED Front-End Engineering Design FHRI Foundation for Human Rights Initiative FIDH International Federation for Human Rights HRDs Human Rights Defenders IFC International Finance Corporation KFDA The Kingfisher Development Area LA License Areas LARF Land Acquisition and Resettlement Framework MoU Memorandum of Understanding NPV Net Present Value PAP Project Affected Persons PAU Petroleum Authority of Uganda RAP Resettlement Action Plans UNOC Uganda National Oil Company Limited UNRA Uganda National Roads Authority UPDF Uganda People’s Defence Force FIDH/FHRI - New Oil, Same Business? At a Crossroads to Avert Catastrophe in Uganda 5 I. INTRODUCTION In 2014, Sub-Saharan Africa held only a tenth of the world’s crude oil reserves, but since 2009, the region has been one of the fastest-growing oil regions in the world.1 Since 2006, a series of oil discoveries under and around Lake Albert in the West of Uganda have led to investment by a consortium of multinational companies, in particular Total Group (“Total”), China National Offshore Oil Corporation (“CNOOC”), and Tullow Oil plc (“Tullow”), as well as by the Ugandan Government.2 According to Uganda’s second National Development Plan (2015/16 - 2019/20), extractive industries represent one of the Government’s priority areas of development.3 The Government is hopeful that the oil industry will have a significant positive impact on Government revenue, on parts of the Ugandan economy, and on Uganda’s geopolitical standing. The Lake Albert oil extraction and development project entails concessions for exploration and extraction to the Joint Venture Partners,4 − with Total operating the oil fields in the northern part of the lake, the Tilenga area, while CNOOC operates those in the southern part, the Kingfisher area – and for a consortium5 to build a refinery in the Hoima district, where some of the oil will be refined for national and regional markets, and from which a pipeline of 1445 km, passing mostly through Tanzanian territory, will take the oil for export to the Indian Ocean port of Tanga on the Tanzanian coast. The negative impacts that the activities of extractive industries can have on human rights and the environment have been documented worldwide.6 These negative impacts are all the more likely to occur when investments are made in countries whose governments do not comply with their duty to respect, protect, and fulfill human rights, or when operators are under pressure to cut costs. These two concerns are both present in Uganda, where the relevant companies are on the verge of a Final Investment Decision on whether to start oil extraction, in a context of economic crisis in the oil sector and narrowing civic space in the country.7 In such a complex context, efforts of the Ugandan govenrment to reinforce its institutional and legal framework to regulate oil exploration and extraction activities have not been sufficient to prevent human rights impacts. Since the initial discoveries, and during the subsequent exploration for oil in the late 2000s, human rights organizations have already reported multiple negative impacts on the environment and the human rights of the populations residing in the areas affected by the oil project, and which they attribute to a diverse range of actors.8 1. International Energy Agency, Africa Energy Outlook. A focus on Energy Prospects in Sub-Saharan Africa, World Energy Outlook Special Report, 2014, p. 48, https://www.icafrica.org/fileadmin/documents/Knowledge/Energy/AfricaEnergyOutlook-IEA.pdf. 2. Luke Patey, Oil in Uganda: Hard bargaining and complex politics in East Africa. Oxford Institute for Energy Studies, October 2015, https://www.oxfordenergy.org/wpcms/wp-content/uploads/2015/10/WPM-601.pdf. 3. The Republic of Uganda, Second National Development plan NDPII (Uganda Vision 2040, June 2015), http://npa.go.ug/wp- content/uploads/NDPII-Final.pdf. 4. The Joint Venture refers to the plans for exploration and production in the Tilenga and Kingfisher areas. As detailed below in section II.2, of the three initial partners in the Joint Venture, only Total and CNOOC now remain, Tullow having sold its shares to Total in 2020. 5. For a detailed description of the constitution of the Consortium, see section II.2.6 below. 6. e.g., FIDH, The Human Cost of Oil, July 2016, https://www.fidh.org/en/region/americas/colombia/oil-extraction-in-colombia- report-reveals-the-human-and-environmental. 7. Adam Morton, “From Covid-19 to climate: what’s next after the global oil and gas industry crash?”, The Guardian (July 11, 2020), https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2020/jul/12/from-covid-19-to-climate-whats-next-after-the-global-oil-and- gas-industry-crash. 8. Bassam Fattouh for Oxford Institute for Energy Studies, Oil in Uganda: Hard bargaining and complex politics in East Africa (October 2015), https://www.oxfordenergy.org/wpcms/wp-content/uploads/2015/10/WPM-601.pdf. 6 FIDH/FHRI - New Oil, Same Business? At a Crossroads to Avert Catastrophe in Uganda FIDH and FHRI undertook this Community-based human rights impact assessment9 (“Assessment” or “Report”) of the Lake Albert project to address these issues. The Report, which is the result of a long process and implements a community-based Human Rights Impact Assessment methodology, documents a number of human rights violations and abuses resulting from the activities of the State of Uganda and the companies developing the oil projects in the Tilenga and Kingfisher areas. In particular, the Report focuses on the right to land, housing, and an adequate standard of living, the right to health and clean water, and the right to a healthy environment. The violations of these rights are inextricably related to violations of the right to information, the right to participation, and the right of access to justice. The Report also emphasizes the great risks of further harm to human and environmental rights in decades to come if Total, CNOOC, and the Ugandan Government fail to enact a series of preventive and remedial measures, as well as larger policy changes, before moving on with the project. 1. The Local and National Context of this Human Rights Impact Assessment of the Lake Albert Oil Extraction Project In order to understand the past, present, and potential future negative impacts of this project, it is important to describe the local context of the project, as well as to highlight the broader complexities related to the overall human rights context in Uganda, along with the additional challenges that extractive industries may bring to this context.