For Kyanjo Sennyonjo, a 78-old-year-old bachelor in rural Uganda, the long-standing mystery of his continually disappearing dinner was recently solved.
Sennyonjo one evening found his tin-roofed home invaded by monkeys, his evening meal pilfered from the saucepan where it had been cooking.
"For all these years, and bear in mind that I am a hunter, I have never seen monkeys stealing cooked food. I thought it was people taking my food. I just looked as they took off," he said at his home at Mairikiti village, 53km southeast of the Ugandan capital Kampala.
The apparent comedy of the case masks a serious problem, as human activities in the region further encroach on the primates' traditional habitat. Man and monkey, it seems, make poor bedfellows.
Villager after villager in the region, nestled in the forested hills on the shores of Lake Victoria, recount similar tales.
The problem seems to be worsening, with the primates moving in large groups, ravaging gardens and devouring all crops in sight including potatoes, beans, maize, yams and bananas. Villagers have begun a monkey crackdown, putting guards on gardens, erecting scarecrows and deploying dogs, according to village elder Ibrahim Semanda.
The efforts are however largely fruitless.
"When the monkeys are many, they overcome the dogs. Even with scarecrows, the monkeys try to shake their bodies and realizing the objects are not real humans, they relaunch the attacks with more vigor," Semanda told reporters.
Some islands on Lake Victoria, Africa's largest body of fresh water, have more monkeys than humans. Junior Agriculture Minister Israel Kibirige Sebunnya, warning that crops will be wiped out if the problem is not addressed, has suggested a novel solution to the problem.
"I wish we could eat these monkeys. I wish we could adopt the habit of eating monkeys like they do in West Africa," Sebunnya told reporters.
From Cameroon to Senegal, monkeys are considered a delicacy.
Meanwhile authorities in the island district of Kalangala, an archipelago on the western side of Lake Victoria, last year introduced a scheme whereby anyone who brings in a monkey's tail receives a reward of 1,000 shillings (about U$0.50).
Director for crop protection in the agriculture ministry Bulegeya Komayombi, however, adopts a more conciliatory approach.
The government, Komayombi told reporters, faces a conflict. It must preserve the environment by protecting the monkeys, but must also curb their spread in order to increase crop production. He said that a softer approach like smearing cow dung -- detested by the monkeys -- on crops like maize is being encouraged.
"Monkeys are a menace, a nuisance. You can lose up to 30 percent of the maize crop to monkeys. There is also labor loss as children and adults spend hours guarding the gardens. Monkeys are known to attack women and children," Komayombi told reporters.
Officials from a state conservation body, the Uganda Wildlife Authority (UWA), maintain that it is humans not monkeys who are responsible for the problem, reasoning that people invaded the habitat of the monkeys by destroying and occupying the forests.
"We have never done a monkey census in the country but they are very very many. In Bugala island [on Lake Victoria], the population of monkeys is larger than that of humans. This is because this area was originally occupied only by monkeys and other animals but government gave out five forests to people and the people and monkeys are competing for space," the UWA's Lillian Nsubuga said.
"Humans do not take account of their activities. They have destroyed the forests which are home to the monkeys and set up farms and settlements. The best monkeys have to do is live on the little left for them or attack humans," she said.
‘IN A DIFFERENT PLACE’: The envoy first visited Shanghai, where he attended a Chinese basketball playoff match, and is to meet top officials in Beijing tomorrow US Secretary of State Antony Blinken yesterday arrived in China on his second visit in a year as the US ramps up pressure on its rival over its support for Russia while also seeking to manage tensions with Beijing. The US diplomat tomorrow is to meet China’s top brass in Beijing, where he is also expected to plead for restraint as Taiwan inaugurates president-elect William Lai (賴清德), and to raise US concerns on Chinese trade practices. However, Blinken is also seeking to stabilize ties, with tensions between the world’s two largest economies easing since his previous visit in June last year. At the
UNSETTLING IMAGES: The scene took place in front of TV crews covering the Trump trial, with a CNN anchor calling it an ‘emotional and unbelievably disturbing moment’ A man who doused himself in an accelerant and set himself on fire outside the courthouse where former US president Donald Trump is on trial has died, police said yesterday. The New York City Police Department (NYPD) said the man was declared dead by staff at an area hospital. The man was in Collect Pond Park at about 1:30pm on Friday when he took out pamphlets espousing conspiracy theories, tossed them around, then doused himself in an accelerant and set himself on fire, officials and witnesses said. A large number of police officers were nearby when it happened. Some officers and bystanders rushed
Beijing is continuing to commit genocide and crimes against humanity against Uyghurs and other Muslim minorities in its western Xinjiang province, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said in a report published on Monday, ahead of his planned visit to China this week. The State Department’s annual human rights report, which documents abuses recorded all over the world during the previous calendar year, repeated language from previous years on the treatment of Muslims in Xinjiang, but the publication raises the issue ahead of delicate talks, including on the war in Ukraine and global trade, between the top U.S. diplomat and Chinese
RIVER TRAGEDY: Local fishers and residents helped rescue people after the vessel capsized, while motorbike taxis evacuated some of the injured At least 58 people going to a funeral died after their overloaded river boat capsized in the Central African Republic’s (CAR) capital, Bangui, the head of civil protection said on Saturday. “We were able to extract 58 lifeless bodies,” Thomas Djimasse told Radio Guira. “We don’t know the total number of people who are underwater. According to witnesses and videos on social media, the wooden boat was carrying more than 300 people — some standing and others perched on wooden structures — when it sank on the Mpoko River on Friday. The vessel was heading to the funeral of a village chief in