Kintu

by Jennifer Nansubuga Makumbi

Nonetheless, most of them felt that “Uganda” should remain a kingdom for the Ganda under their kabaka so that things would go back to the way they were before Europeans came. Uganda was a patchwork of fifty or so tribes. The Ganda did not want it. The union of tribes brought no apparent advantage to them apart from a deluge of immigrants from wherever, coming to Kampala to take their land. Meanwhile, the other fifty or so tribes looked on flabbergasted as the British drew borders and told them that they were now Ugandans. Their histories, cultures, and identities were overwritten by the mispronounced name of an insufferably haughty tribe propped above them. But to the Ganda, the reality of Uganda as opposed to Buganda only sank in when, after independence, Obote overran the kabaka’s lubiri with tanks, exiling Muteesa and banning all kingdoms. The desecration of their kingdom by foreigners paralyzed the Ganda for decades. As Buganda faded and Uganda started to take root, it became clear that education was paramount in the new nation. Attitudes toward the schooling of children among commoners started to change to the point where educating children was the same as putting money away into a pension fund. By the late 50s, fathers close to European civilization realized that an educated daughter made for a better pension fund than an educated son.