Activists accuse bank of suppressing pipeline protests

Environmental activists have accused one of Kenya’s largest banks of suppressing protest over the controversial East African Crude Oil Pipeline (EACOP), reports The Independent. The EACOP is a proposed 1 443km heated pipeline that will transport oil from hydrocarbon fields around Hoima, Uganda, to the port of Tanga in Tanzania. KCB Bank, through its subsidiary in Uganda, are providing some financing for the project alongside a number of other institutions. Protests over the project have been going on for years – with a report from Human Rights Watch (HRW) claiming that the pipeline would displace more than 100 000 people, in addition to exacerbating the climate crisis. Compensation to displaced people is too low, and take years to arrive, according to HRW. EACOP has been under development since 2013 and under construction since 2017, but has long faced delays related to uncertain financing, with 43 banks and 30 insurers making public commitments to not support the project over environmental and human rights concerns, according to the stopEACOP campaign. But at the end of March 2025, EACOP announced it had closed its first tranche of external financing for the project, with financing from banks including SA’s Standard Bank, the African Export Import Bank, Stanbic Bank Uganda and KCB Bank Uganda. Then last month, 11 environmental activists travelled to the KCB Bank Uganda’s headquarters in Kampala to deliver a petition demanding its withdrawal from EACOP. There they were handed to police officers who arrested them. They are still being detained. The petition that stop EACOP activists took to KCB’s headquarters in April, highlights human rights and environmental concerns, and calls on KCB to ‘review and rescind its decision to finance the EACOP project immediately’.