On a tiny island on the world’s second-largest freshwater lake two nations wage Africa’s “smallest war.”
An iron-clad tortoise of rock and sheet metal juts from Lake Victoria, christened after Britain’s late queen, surrounded by over 23,000 square miles of water. Here a thronging mix of nationalities mingles—despite territorial disputes, competition over fishing, and myriad viewpoints—all in relative harmony on an island less than half the size of a football field.
All this began over three decades ago, with reports of fishermen earning three to four times in a day what shore-based cohorts earned in a month, driving anglers to seek their fortunes on Migingo Island, the outcrop in question, at the very source of the Nile River.
The catch? Besides the lucrative and plentiful Nile perch, now in supreme demand, Migingo Island lies right beside the Kenyan-Ugandan border, and conflicting claims placed that lonely rock within either’s dominion, depending on who you asked. The question of who would profit and who would tax whom became the center of a dispute.
In the early years of this contest, from 1991, when Migingo Island was still covered in birds, snakes, and weeds, ventures were made by Ugandan police, Kenyan marines, and intrepid fishermen to pitch tents, build huts, and raise their national flags here, because of the island’s closeness to deep waters where fishing was growing lucrative.
Ultimately, agreements were meted out amicably, and fishermen from both countries were let ashore to fish, although surveys concluded, as Uganda finally conceded, that Migingo was Kenyan; a joint committee (and Google Maps) offered ample proof of this. The island lies 510 meters inside Kenya’s territory.
In 2009, the island’s inhabitants numbered 130. Today, reports say there are anywhere from 400 to over 1,000 crammed together on that tiny rock, making it one of the most crowded islands on Earth.
The spirit of entrepreneurship thrives on Migingo Island, yet where there are profits to be made there will be those seeking to exploit. Among the mesh of sheet metal enclosures blanketing the outcrop are supermarkets, a pharmacy, bars, brothels, a makeshift open-air casino, barbershops, and scales for fishermen. Reportedly, everyone who lives here has their own business.
Daniel Obadha ran a barbershop and a phone-charging station for several years. “I like to live on Migingo,” he told Aljazeera. “Thanks to many customers coming not only from Kenya but also from Uganda and Tanzania, there is a lot of business, and I earn much more money than I did on the mainland.” According to Mr. Hattab, one appeal the island has for its diverse congregation is that no visas are required to live here.
Eddison Ouma, a fisherman from Uganda, has lived here for over half a decade, but due to the long boat ride home he is only able to visit his family twice a year. “We don’t have jobs. That’s why we are fishing,” Mr. Ouma said in 2019, adding that he pays a few fish as a “protection tax” to the Ugandan police who patrol the waters. Since 2004, both police and marines were deployed to protect fishermen from pirates, who, Mr. Hattab was told, continue to dog them today.
Another party to capitalize on the profits are boat charters, who have reaped large sums by charging fishermen, who don’t own boats, eight-tenths of their catch to use their vessels, Aljazeera reported.
Peace hangs between two viewpoints on Migingo Island: Kenyans have made the unusual claim that Nile perch breed in the shallower Kenyan waters and, therefore, belong to them. Ugandans rightfully claim the depths where they thrive in abundance, though the island is undoubtedly Kenyan. Now co-managed by both nations, the island strives to heal amid Africa’s “smallest war.”
And so as governments contest claims over the outcrop, the question facing the fishermen and their fortunes persists: “How long can we hold them off our backs?”
