Kampala Bill is not fair to Buganda and the rest of Ugandans

June 29, 2009 at 10:36 pm (Geography, KINGDOMS, Land matters, POLITICS, Uncategorized)
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Fellow Ugandans,
 
 I cannot imagine going to Mbarara or Gulu and taking over such perimeters without expected push back. President Museveni and his administration have become a very strange bed fellow when it comes to Buganda property, not only land but other revenue generating properties that seem to have been targeted to render defunct or non functional the cash cows for Buganda. In essence housing the capital of Uganda has been a nightmare for the tribe.
If the administration wanted to annex cities of regions from the previous 10 districts, then it ought to have done it across the board, take Jinja, Mbarara, Gulu and many other towns as a fair legislative move. Singling out Buganda things, simply because it is the capital has brought such unpopularity to the NRM/O both at home and abroad among seriously concerned Baganda.
 My friend Kiyonga the political strategist has to be thinking beyond one presidency for his party! Having such unfair unilateral moves that target and impoverish Buganda cannot be a good thing for his party’s future. Incidentally the Baganda seem to have lost out disproportionately, in terms of economics, environment and lives wasted.  
In the eyes of political forecasters this mounts to political party suicide given the projected future census of Buganda. Simply thinking that “generations would have changed and the ills will be long forgoten” is a myopic strategy. Had the folks in UPC been more foresighted during their reign, they would be enjoying incredible popularity today. Besides, why legislate on something that will definitely be reversed in the future?
Writing legislation to take so much out of Buganda alone is not only blatantly unfair it is discriminatory.
Look, Buganda/Baganda aided the Museveni administration to get in power, and it/they have paid the ultimate price. Buganda lost most of it’s ability to raise revenue take for instance, the Electricity project wich seems to have been designed without regard to Bugandan investors, who owned the old Owen falls dam. The adminstration did not have a plan or good will to replace Buganda’s investment with any other viable or similar revenue generating project. The Baganda like the Indians also had staked carefully their own revenue generating strategies and taking them away without adequate remuneration afforded to Indians is what’s put them at odds with the administration.
Even the Bristish who colonized us longer, did not take as much away from Buganda as has president Museveni and his administration. Here in Boston,echoes of disenchantment for the NRM/O party are heard from even those that are not following these debates closely. 
I often say to my NRM/O friends in the USA that rescuing the NRM/O name in our towns is more difficult, because, people here see the party as the one that has taken on a very selfish posture to impoverish Baganda by overtly disenfranchising them at every turn. It will take a concerted effort to get back in the good graces of many Baganda, who have of late acquired this complex spline from irreparable suffrage. Laughing it away is unwise, un stately and indeed sadist to say the least. I hope the president will be able to look Bostonians in the eyes when he comes in September and empirically convince them that this ain’t so!
 
 
Tendo
Ugandan in Boston

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What does ‘Kampala’ mean?

May 26, 2009 at 10:41 am (CULTURE, Geography, Land matters)
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Dear UAH,

I would like to correct a few people telling lies about insects called ‘empala’. I am a student of African history from when Africa had no such thing as the Sahara Desert to the present time. I have not read anywhere that there was such insects in Buganda . unless there are yet some books on Uganda ’s history that have escaped my notice.

What I have read is that there were animals on the hill of what is now our capital city that the white man called ‘Impala’. There were so many everywhere that the white men kept referring to the place where these animals were as ‘the hill of the Impalas’. When translated to the natives it sounded like this: “Ako kasozi ka Mpala”. After some time the words ‘akasozi’ were dropped and there remained the words ‘ka Mpala‘. This was later turned into Kampala our present city. This story was narrated to me and other students at the Universsity of London’s School of African Studies (SOAS) by then Dr David Anderson, now Professor of African History at Oxford University.That story makes more sense than yours of insects called empala because there is another town in Kampala called Bakuli. Do you know why? I will tell you. There used to be a white man at this place who had a beautiful house and his name was Barclay. Whenever the Baganda passed his house they would marvel ata its beauty and it became known in Luganda as ’ewa Bakuli’ which, when translated in English was ‘at Barclays’. Yet another story is that of what the Baganda call ‘Mandaazi‘ (pancakes). The story goes that one day a white man was doing his rounds of women in the slums of Kampala and met this family that gave him what looked like pancakes. When he put them in his mouth and ate them, he was heard exclaiming: “Man does”. Excited Baganda heard him and told their friends; “He said it is mandaazi.” The name has remained since!

I think changing the name of Kampala would be a very silly mistake. It is a beautiful name with many sad and good memories for all those that have ever been there.

DR.HENRY GOMBYA

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Kenya has no lake worth writing home about

April 23, 2009 at 9:14 pm (Geography, Land matters, POLITICS)
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Ugandans,
The trouble with Migingo is, that you are dealing with artisanal fisherfolk (the equivalent of your small holders..the peasants and the balaalo)…they are the peasants of the waters.  They are not even a community as such.  Migingo, the rocky acre is just a beachhead for fishing deep inside Bugiri.
The portion of Nalubaale that belongs to Kenya is too shallow for meaningful fishing and this is what YK Museveni has observed, when he emphasizes the point of the waters to the West of the islands.  If the brothers in Kenya insist on strict policing of the borders then they will take Migingo, but it will be useless for them, especially if Uganda reciprocates by saying: keep out!  Kenyan fishefolk can only fish in Bugiri.  Kenya has no lake worth writing home about.  Migingo is only useful as a beachhead for fishing in the deeper waters of Southern Bugiri and Mukono, bordering with Tanzania.  That is where they get all the fish from.
Note that, the bit of Nalubale that belongs to Kenya is too muddy for fish to thrive.  From the bit of military geography of that area that I remember, there are are about 12 rivers that drain into Kenya victoria, depositing a heavy load of soil from the highlands West of the Rift Valley.  Fish can not live there…except may be a bit of Nile Perch.  When Nile Perch (which thrives in shallower waters) was introduced in the lake smaller species like tilapia took cover in the deeper waters where NP could not venture (hence the unscientific myth that NP had finished tilapia….the latter run into exile deep in Bugiri and Mukono)
Those Kenya islands are in fact peaks and crests of the portion of the Kenya highlands that borders the lake.  When you look at the contours of Pyramid Island and the Island east of Migingo, all you see is that, land was submerged at the birth of Nalubaale but the peaks of some hills were too high to be covered completely by water.  The largest of the Kavirondo islands, Mfangano is just the tip of a mountain, as you can see in the attached images.
Solution: final solution to small producers…the lake peasants, like I have been agitating for the land peasants..  Let fishing go industrial, deploy a couple of industrial trawlers in Bugiri…some of them can even be the size of Migingo…you know…which catch, process, pack and freeze the fish ready for export.  Let us enforce the borders, as Kenya wants, and we keep their fisherfolk out of Uganda waters that they survive in.  As you can see from the topography of the area, their waters are too shallow for industrial trawlers.  They would as soon close all the 13 or so fish processing plants on their shores of Victoria.  I would even put sonar in our trawlers to call up all the fish from their shallows..  They would not win. That would be the end of fresh water fish for them, especially as L Turkana atrophies as a result of Zenawi’s the hydropower project further up in the Oromo valley.
The Migingo hysteria is no different from the balaalo issue, and the small peasants in the crop farming areas: being stuck in small timer production.  Actually YK Museveni has already looked beyond the hysteria of the rocky acre and identified the centre of gravity of the little quarrel: the deep waters of Bugiri and Mukono. He is laughing at those who think the rocky acre is the decisive factor.
My interest in telling Uganda to get their hands off that rock is first it belongs to Kenya a fact that we want to ignore, and secondly, it does not really matter for some one that is determined to harvest fish from that pond called Nalubale.  Uganda, go trawler.

Lance Corporal (Rtd) Otto Patrick

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MIGINGO IS UGINGO AND IT IS IN KENYA

April 16, 2009 at 11:32 pm (Geography, conflicts)
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Forumists,
1/4 I have scribbled out some comments on Ugingo, also called Migingo.  What you will see is, that the Island is clearly inside Kenya territory and Uganda should have nothing to do with claiming it.
2/4 Ugandan authorities should move swiftly to deescalate the hysteria surrounding that island by withdrawing any claims thereto, and ensuring that elements of the Ugandan bureaucracy and armed forces and are withdrawn in an ordely and expeditious manner.  Measures should also be taken to ensure that any strains in Uganda’s relations with Kenya are mended; but most importantly, to ensure that ordinary Ugandan fisherfolk that have made that island their base are protected from likely reprisals from those that have been incovinienced by the recent confusion, particularly the Kenyans.
3/4 References to surveying etc are redundant procrastination because that border was surveyed many decades ago and documents showing its alignment are available, not least the Constitution of the Republic of Uganda, Schedule 2 which categorically stipulates that, the Western-most point of Pyramid Island, itself located Southwest of Migingo or Ugingo is the border marker.  In light of the fact that Pyramid Island is East of the border, and Migingo is East of Pyramid, there is no way Migingo can be in Uganda.  We only make fools of ourselves to make such reckless claims when historical documents showing our territorial limits are available, and when facilities like Google Earth are freely available as a reference.
4/4 Please see my attached detailed views on the pseudocrisis, with satellite images that show the position of the border and Migingo.  I have also attached for you the US Department of State International Boundary Study No 139 (August 27th 1973) on the Kenya-Uganda boundary..
That Island you are wondering about is Sumba Island which is mentioned in the second schedule of the Uganda constitution as the last island to the north before the border proceeds to the mouth of River Sio on the mainland..  This is what our constitution says about Sumba:
“From this point, the boundary continues following a straight line southwesterly to the most northerly point of Sumba Island; thence by the western and southwestern shores of that island to its most southerly point..”
By ‘this point’ is meant the mouth of River Sio.
Some people say: ‘…now if the dispute were with that one I would lend out an ear!’.  I think they would be squandering their ears.  As one can see from above, the border follows along the western shores of that island, therefore making all of it belong to Kenya.
The little speck right with in the campus (rt hand corner) is called Namulamia Island.  Between Sumba and the Kenyan mainland, the stretch of the lake is called Sumba Channel.

Lance Corporal (Rtd) Otto Patrick

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RUKWANZI ISLAND: IS IT IN UGANDA OR DRC

March 5, 2009 at 6:14 pm (Africa, Geography, POLITICS)

Forumists,

1/7 When one takes a closer look at the open source satellite imagery of the Uganda/DRC border, it seems that Rukwanzi Island is not part of Uganda.  The Island appears to be 0.89 km inside DRC territory.  This is according to Google Earth imagery (provided by among others, NASA).  Look at the attachment to this message showing two Google Earth extracts of the Lake Mwitanzige (Albert) basin taken at different altitudes, very close to the mouth of River Semliki.  The yellow line is the international boundary with DRC.

2/7 It is unfortunate that the documents that outline the alignment of the border are silent on any reference points over the lake. The only instance that would make one hope that the island is in our territory is Emin Pasha’s 1886 account of ‘…. discovery of a new [sic] river flowing from Usongora mountains.’ Pasha further noted that, ‘It is of considerable size and flows into the lake at the south…. Contains a large island near its junction with the lake.’ [Schweinfurth, G (1888), Emin Pasha in Central Africa, pp. 187, 179 and 570.

3/7 In the quote above, I underline ‘near’ to ensure that we do not interpret it as, ‘at’.  Had Emin Pasha stated that the island was at the junction of the river with the lake, there would have been grounds to claim that the boundary was subsequently ill-demarcated, in light of the fact that it coincides with the thalweg of the Semliki and the Semliki opens directly into the Lake, therefore making it possible for us to have half the Island.  This is the false impression that William Rwebembera of the New Vision made by distorting the map of the area in his 10th August 2007 article.

4/7 The last figure in the attachment is an extract of the map of Uganda sectioned out in 317 grids, each representing a map of scale 1:25,000..  Maps 46/4 and 47/3 available from Lands and Survey in Entebbe cover the area of our interest.  They should be looked at closely to confirm whether that Island is on the Ugandan or the DRC side of the border.

5/7 There were several press reports indicating that locals in the lake basin know the island to be on the Uganda side because they have always fished there.  This is only testimony to the inconveniences that Berlin borders have visited upon communities in frontier zones but not a confirmation of where Rukwanzi belongs.  All of us know the Kitgum frontier zone with Sudan: it is called Ngom Orom, i.e., the land that belongs to all, or put differently, to-whom-it-may-concern-territory.

6/7 The many decades of the ineptitude of the Zairean state may have turned Rukwanzi into an Ngom Orom.  The discovery of oil, and regime change in Kinsasha might be altering that state of affairs.  I have read that in the Bantu dialects, ‘Rukwanzi’ means a bead, which many parents of restless toddlers know to be a choke hazard.

7/7 It may be dangerous for us to assume that Rukwanzi is in Uganda, when it may not be.  We should not hope that DRC authorities will remain as sleepy as they have been for many years.  If we are right, it may be advisable that, Google Maps is alerted to the extent to which it is misrepresenting the country’s frontiers: if a DRC researcher looks at that map the way it is now, it may be a source of embarrasment.  A bid by Uganda to swallow that bead could easily cause severe choking.

Lance Corporal (Rtd) Otto Patrick

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