On the edge of Kampala, the hard lines of the city start to blur, smudging into soft hills where the breeze rustles through banana leaves.
This is the district of Wakiso, which surrounds the Ugandan capital like a cradling hand. It is an in-between place, where village becomes city, and the thud of the hoe gives way to the roar of mechanical graders.
Everybody here wants land. Brokers thumb through dog-eared title deeds. Surveyors prowl with their theodolites, measuring precise angles on rolling fields.
Everybody here wants land. Brokers thumb through dog-eared title deeds. Surveyors prowl with their theodolites, measuring precise angles on rolling fields.
And last December, in Namayumba sub-county, a posse of heavyset men made camp in a grove of trees, signalling the start of a tussle that would leave 1,000 people in fear for their homes.
There was nothing unusual about this dispute. Land conflict has become commonplace in Wakiso, a district of more than three million people.
And it is a recurring theme in many African countries as cities seep into their hinterlands, washing away established boundaries and old patterns of living.
In Ghana, vigilantes known as “land guards” violently enforce rival claims for land around Accra. In Ethiopia, the expansion of Addis Ababa has unearthed fraught questions of ethnicity and nationhood.
In Zambia and Tanzania, survey data shows the growth of commercial farms owned by rich city-dwellers, especially in areas close to towns.
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