Benjamin Rukwengye
In its heyday, Kijura, the village where I was born, had a couple of tea factories, an airstrip, a post office, urbane staff quarters, a nursery school, a fully-equipped health centre, and a members’ club. It also hosted a unique ensemble of ethnicities unlike many urban centres even today.
You had the native Batooro who couldn’t be bothered to pick the tea leaves, and the agro-industrial Europeans who were the money and brains behind the trade. There were also, some Baganda, Nubians, and an influx of Bakiga, Bafumbira, and Banyarwanda, all of whom had come to work in the factories and estates.
Eventually, many of them acquired land, built homes, and settled. This was their new home and they put their savings and sweat into it. They were hardworking, resourceful, and ambitious. The resultant local economic boom allowed many families in the area to send their kids to schools in Fort Portal and Kampala – which they wouldn’t have been able to do – sooner – without that extra “foreigner” injection into their ways of life. Similarly for Kampala, where less than 10 percent of the population could be classified as Ba nasangwawo (natives).
Through the 60s, 70s, 80s, and 90s – and even as you read this column – thousands crossed Lwera, Karuma, Kiira, or wherever every day, because the city promised better fortunes.
There are, also, lots of immigrants who are in Uganda because they want to. The vexing ‘Muzungu Boda’ is one such. Many others have settled into communities in Kampala, Jinja, Fort Portal, Gulu, etc, and are running or working for enterprises and non-profits that are making a difference. We don’t tell them who to date and marry. We don’t complain when they take up houses in Muyenga, Kololo, Bugolobi, and Naguru, where landlords insist on being paid in dollars. We simply move to Najeera, Kira, and Bulindo and continue to look for our next big break.
If we are lucky and bang a deal, we go to Zirobwe, buy land, and build a home for our kids. Basically, there is evidence – even with us – that opportunities can be unlocked by letting new people, new cultures, and new spirits – Holy and otherwise – into the soul of our communities. That is the lens through which the current debate about the influx of Eritreans in Makindye division should be seen.
Unlike the Muzungus who are here for “lakizhare”, the people you see in the Muyenga-Bunga-Kansanga-Gaba-Buziga axis have escaped what is perhaps, the world’s most repressive regime.
Eritrea has never held an election and has no parliament or judiciary. Whatever you might think of Uganda’s parliament and judiciary, at least they exist. It has compulsory – indefinite – military service and family members of those who escape have been known to get arrested and detained indefinitely. No courts, remember? The country is largely cut off from the rest of the world and global finance reports can’t even find reliable data to capture how poor the country is, based on the purchasing power parity (PPP) index. This is what they are running away from.
Inversely though, the country’s circumstances have inevitably built its people’s grit and perseverance, made them industrious and resourceful, taught them to harness the power of community, and gotten them to work like horses. The rapid real estate and business development in the area is evidence of this.
It is also evidence that they are here for the long haul, which is a great thing because we know that they have skin in the game. They see this as their home and are putting their cards on the table. Their ways might be different from ours and in some ways, they might upset the social balance of things. But there is enough Kampala and Uganda for all of us. Needless to add, look around you; isn’t it giving potential refugee status?
Mr Rukwengye is the founder, Boundless Minds.
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