Photos: Marcus Relton
The feature documentary ‘Out From Under Us‘ about land grabs, human-rights abuses, and alleged genocide against the Acholi people in northern Uganda is launching a crowdfunding campaign on Tuesday, 1 August, to help it to completion.
UK-based filmmaker Marcus Relton started filming in 2013 then raised funds to make a feature documentary in 2016, working with Uganda-based filmmaker and journalist Sam Lawino, who started covering land grabs in Amuru district, in Acholiland, in 2012.
The film focuses on government pressure for the Acholi to give 40,000 hectares – about 150 square miles – of their communally owned land for free to the Madhvani Group of Companies, in Lakang and Kololo, an area believed to be rich in oil.
It also focuses on moves to turn land in Apaa into a game reserve and move an entire Acholi community into the neighboring Adjumani district, where the Madi tribe live.
It focuses on the struggle between the communities, helped by the Acholi MPs and government forces, involving naked protests, bullets, beatings, tear gas and bombs against unarmed farmers and military men posing as civilians attacking third-generation farmers with poison arrows, machetes and spears.
The film gives the context of 20 years of civil war, after the Museveni regime’s victorious National Resistance Army swept north, after seizing power in Kampala, in 1986. It slaughtered Acholi civilians, sparking three rebellions. The last, the Lord’s Resistance Army, led by Joseph Kony, joined peace talks and agreed to leave Uganda from 2007 to 2008, when Acholi civilians started to leave the camps and return home.
Acholi politicians ask why almost all their people were forced into camps rife with disease, malnutrition and mistreatment, where more died than in the fighting. They ask why the government took the Acholi’s cattle, then, when Acholi farmers started to return home, said their land, the second pillar of their economy, after their cattle, was no longer theirs.
Some have accused the Ugandan government of a long-running, genocidal campaign. Others ask why the International Criminal Court only targeted LRA rebel commanders and not the government’s, given blatant massacres and atrocities by NRA forces and the systematic destruction of Acholi society and livelihood since 1986.
The film has reached its first rough cut, despite delays during the Covid pandemic. Production company 1DigitTV and Marcus are crowdfunding as they look to get back on track after delays during the Covid pandemic, then completed and distributed to international and Ugandan audiences.
The crowdfunding page is at https://greenlit.com/project/out-under-us
Could anyone who can’t donate share the details to try to find those who can. The campaign goes live at 11am UK time on Tuesday 1 August, 1pm Ugandan, 6am Eastern US time and 3am Pacific US time and will run until 5pm UK time on Friday 1 September, 7pm Uganda, midday Eastern US and 9am Pacific US time. Continental Europe is one hour ahead of the United Kingdom.
The filmmakers will hold a virtual event, with a trailer from the film and discussion, including Acholi MPs who represent Amuru district, on Monday, 31 July, at 6.30pm UK time, 8.30pm Uganda time, 1.30pm Eastern US time, 10.30am US Pacific time and 7.30pm continental European time.
Please email [email protected] for a link to the event.
The crowdfunding page is at https://greenlit.com/project/out-under-us
