Ugandan landslide kills at least 80, many missing - minister

A landslide in eastern Uganda has killed at least 80 people and villagers are digging with bare hands and simple tools in the hope of finding survivors, a government minister and Ugandan media said yesterday.

Ugandan media said the landslide engulfed a village in the eastern Bududa district on the foothills of Mt Elgon on Monday night after a seven-hour downpour.

"The latest reports I have indicate 80 bodies have been pulled out," Tarsis Kabwegyere, Minister for Disaster Preparedness and Refugees, said.

The local NTV channel showed mud and wattle houses flattened by viscous earth and wailing villagers piling bodies on a grassy compound.

"About 300 people are feared buried by the landslide and the landslides are expected to continue as the rains intensify in the region," he said earlier yesterday.

Mr Kabwegyere said a government response team was on the ground with food and the Red Cross had sent doctors. Police and volunteers were also helping in the rescue.

Parts of Uganda and neighbouring Kenya have had sustained rain for much of the past two months, which is usually a dry period between rainy seasons.

Local MP David Wakikoona said villagers had told him about 100 to 150 people were at a trading centre when huge rocks slid down the hillsides, transported by mud. Only eight people were known to have survived so far, he said.

"So in all likelihood the death toll will be more than a 100," he said. The legislator said residents were using shovels, hoes and their bare hands to dig through mounds of earth to retrieve buried neighbours.