Okay, so here are my final thoughts on Uganda ... ...
Uganda is so lush and fertile – it’s amazing. That explains the abundance of huge and juicy mosquitoes. It is not uncommon to see that many people use mosquito nets out there. That certainly had me thinking … … how come over all these years, we have been waiting for a malaria vaccine that seems to be elusive, to say the least. Hmm.. I’m glad the Malaria Consortium seems to be working on that – this is where responsible African governments who know that malaria can slow the working population down, kill many young children etc etc will invest in young people who are interested in medicine – specifically, tropical medicine. You take some of those young brains, and then you give them the best training in research in tropical diseases, build a laboratory, equip it, and support them enough to find solutions to some of our problems. It is costly, yes, but it is needed. As I keep saying – sure, we can do without the donor money if we manage what we have and stop sending 100 people to accompany our leaders to summits and conferences, scale back the corruption, let’s look forward and develop our processing and refining capacity and export finished products etc etc etc…. generate money from within to support R & D.
I had the opportunity to visit Bujagali waterfalls and go to Jinja to see the source of the river Nile. I will share pictures later – it was heavenly! Lush and green and beauuutiful. Truly beautiful country that has so much potential to do better kraa. The stories I’ve heard about the fertility of the Nile Crescent began to make a whole lot of sense to me after visiting the area. Was also exposed to the abundance of street children and harsh levels of poverty. We have a long way to go oh, hmm. On the way to Jinja, we were told that our options for emptying our tanks were limited – use the “bush toilet.” A rude shock for those not accustomed to life in these parts. On the way, since there are no rest areas along the way, buses would stop so people could walk into the bush to handle their business. That had me thinking … … if I had money, that’s one thing I’d invest in – provide rest areas with bathrooms, food etc etc along the main trunk roads, and charge a fee for the use of services. This would be most helpful between Accra and Cape – Takoradi – Axim, or Accra – Nsawam – Kumasi – Sunyani – Tamale, or Accra – Ho, or … just place them at intervals along these main roads. Besides providing an option for travelers to stop and relax, it would also designate places where buses can stop rather than stopping whenever the driver needs to use the “Bush T”, or when a passenger has a running stomach. We would have to hire people to keep out hawkers and ask the public to help us by not patronizing the roadside hawking option. Perhaps locate these places in areas where there are no immediate villages etc. Anyway, there’s an idea for someone to pick up on. If and when you do build these, do give me credit for raising your interest in it, okay? Heheheh. If I had the money to do things eh, … … there are so many projects I have in mind! If you have money to invest in a creative young mind with tons of great ideas, please get in touch, and let’s work some miracles to save the motherland! (wink, wink, hehe).
Talking about roadside hawking – I was impressed to see that to avoid impostors trying to sell to travelers, hawkers along the trunk road to Jinja were all given numbers, which were put on blue vests they all wore. That way, if someone run away with your change, then you would be able to trace him or her using his/her number. Then also, you would be able to monitor the number of legitimate sellers by issuing the appropriate number of vests. I just thought hmm … now that’s a form of progress, you know.
Besides the crazy driving, roadside markets, South African–owned businesses etc, we do have a lot in common with each other on the continent. The good, the bad and the clueless. We are all bombarded with Spanish soap operas (old ones too oh) on our television stations. We are all fans and patronizers of Nollywood. Ei! As for the influence of Nollywood dieh e no be small kraa oh. Hwee! These movies are so common, and although I think the themes are so tired and used, I am proud of what the Nigerians are doing. Their acting has improved as the industry has grown – in terms of quality and quantity. Their actors speak with their ‘Nigerian’ accent, and they don’t try to ‘slang’ their way through with LAFA the way we see our Ghanaian actors doing. By the way, LAFA = Locally Acquired Foreign Accent. They have so many movies with the same direction – gangs, adulterous relationships and revenge, witchcraft and curses, etc etc etc… The popularity of Nollywood is what made the victory over the Nigerian Eagles (soccer team) even more sweddet! I was happy for the Cranes (Ugandan soccer team). They did well, and it united the country in a good way. Sadly, they were beaten by Lesotho, and I wonder how far they went … … Soccer is huge in Uganda – specifically, European soccer – Arsenal, ManU, Liverpool, … u name it, and they’re crazy fans! Na wao! Interesting – the power of marketing.
Another shared problem we have is the role of foreign companies in managing the big, income-generating businesses in our countries. The South Africans are firmly planted on the ground there, just as we have them in Ghana – MTN (telecom company that is very similar to Spacefon) Shoprite, Game etc etc.. A South African company actually provides and distributes electricity to Ugandans. Ei! They have power outages (Uganda moments), just like we on this side have our ‘Ghana moments.” There was a neat article I saw in the papers (New Vision) about biofuels, and the possibility of using geothermal energy – power derived from high-pressure hot springs that rise from the core of the earth. That was neat. You see, I strongly believe in getting Africa to a level where what works in a particular region etc is what is used. Solar energy is an option for us all, and like I keep saying, it’s an investment that’s worth exploring and developing. If we had a higher demand for solar panels, we’d have more producers entering the market, and after a while, we would have more affordable prices. Energy – Africa’s biggest headache needs new approaches and solutions. The excuse of R&D being too expensive should no longer be an excuse. It’s only through R & D that we can find out what works and what doesn’t, and find customized/contextualized solutions for our problems. For me this approach is sooo obvious that it drives me nuts that our governments don’t seem to see it. If they can’t invest in R & D, then the least they can do is to provide support – logistic, financial, moral etc for such initiatives. If I had money (listen up, those of you reading with deep pockets), I would set up a national endowment fund for R&D and sponsor research in any and every area possible – from archeology to zoology. I would lend extra support to research projects that attempt to find solutions to problems by learning from our neighbors in the global south. It’s very, very important and must be prioritized!!!
Another similarity is our ‘religiosity/religiousness’- whichever sounds better. There are many Christian stations on radio and TV, and there are many US-originated programs. Some of the local Christian programs were peppered with the ‘typical’ southern US Baptist preaching style with organ and drum action in the background etc. Interesting. With regards to programming, one other thing that I noticed was the extensive use of music video fillers on TV. I like the rhythms in their music – nice flavor. Oh, and my adorable nephews taught me all about Boby Wine – a very popular musician who sees himself as a social critic. His latest release is called Kiwani (pronounced with ‘ch’ sound – chiwani), in which he talks about disguises/masks.... forgotten the explanation I was given. hehehe. He also has a song about polythene bags that litter and pollute the environment – the ‘wiase ye sum’ bags that are used all over the place for any and everything – from packaging purchased goods, food and sadly for human waste as well, in areas where there are no toilets. Na wao!
I found it interesting that in speaking English, “me” precedes “I” very often … me I need to go now, me I think it’s a good idea, me I don’t know … … This, I think may be a general eastern African thing. While lounging around on my first night in Kampala, I watched a TV program about domestic violence. In this show, the man raped his wife, leaving her with a lot of bruises etc... She complained to her best friend neighbor about it, and her friend’s response was that it probably wasn’t that bad or didn’t hurt because she doesn’t scream. If you don’t scream, then it doesn’t hurt. You know, sadly, this kind of attitude is not unheard of in these parts. We make excuses and dismiss sexual violence against women. The attitude is that he’s a respectable man (on the outside), and so that makes it difficult to think that he’d do such a thing. The victim was told to basically just deal with it. It is not uncommon to hear people comment on provocative dressing as a factor that creates fertile ground for rape. That is absolute nonsense! I am not condoning ‘apuskeleke’ dressing, but come on! … we can’t use such crass excuses to shift our focus from the fact that rape, regardless of why it occurs is wrong, full stop! This is not limited to Africa though – stories from around the world abound. And then also you have all these weak sentences. I say any man who rapes a child should be castrated. Yes, I did say castration. He doesn’t deserve to keep the weapon of assault – he’s abused the rift to have it, to take it away. If I were president … … rapists, run for your life – whether you’re perceived as big shots, ‘good’ husbands/fathers, wealthy, old or … whatever, just run for dear life. Okay, moving right along…
Talking about me being president – each time I asked people about their opinions on Museveni and how he’s doing, I almost always got the same ‘seemingly scripted’ response that he’s ‘trying.’ There seemed to be this level of political ‘husfulness’ where everyone either said he was trying, or said nothing at all. It said something about freedom of speech. After forcing a few people to open up, I learnt that though he hadn’t brought much progress, the country had come very far from where it used to be, so some feel he’s not been that bad of a leader. All the same, many share the same lamentation – that so much money has been poured into Uganda to support different causes – AIDS, education, poverty in general etc etc, and all of it has disappeared into thin air (better still, all the money has been transformed into the hot air that politicians seems to let out in all their talk-talk). Oh well … what else is new?
It was interesting to note that a few people truly see Ghana as a beacon of hope for Africa. Someone told me how she’d heard that the roads in Ghana were in great shape, and she’d heard that in Ghana there are good roads, and infrastructure in general is excellent. I smiled … I realized that other people (she’s not the first I’ve met) on the continent look up to Ghana as the nation that is setting the pace and championing African excellence, for real. Wow. Honestly though, … I returned to Ghana with a new appreciation for what we have here, even though we still have a looong way to go. Many of the roads in Kampala were under construction - for her eyes only. The construction was all in anticipation of the queen’s arrival. Now this is one thing that bothers me to no end! We sit in the filth, poor infrastructure etc, and then we only ‘beautification’ our cities when foreign dignitaries are visiting. So this basically means that we deserve the poor infrastructure etc… This is the African’s lack of self-respect and dignity that kills us oh! Read one of my earlier blogs – I think it was the 2004 or 2005 one in which I share the story of how I went to face a Catholic priest about why we worship a Caucasian Jesus with blond hair and blue eyes. The man was neither Caucasian nor African, but we are created in God’s image, so Christ is Indian, Ghanaian, Colombian, American, Swedish, Australian, Chinese, Malaysian, Ugandan, Chilean, etc etc etc…. If somebody paints Christ according to his likeness, why can’t I, the African do the same? …. This feeds into how we revere white folks and have the mentality that they are such amazing people who can do all these things in technology etc. One phrase I constantly here is “ei, abrofo ho ye hu oh”, meaning white people are amazing oh. I’m not trying to diss white folks – aren’t we all children of God? Yes we are, so I treat all equally – I’m an equal opportunity commentator. I’m not trying to cause any ruckus, but to force us to really consider, reconsider and re-reconsider how we see things. I tell you, a good 99% of our problems start from our mentality.
Talking about foreigners running the show, … someone explained to me that the AIDS crisis really wiped out a generation of Ugandans, and though it’s now under control, that phase in their national life brought about the importing of foreign talent to do the work in the private sector, and even more so in the nonprofit sector. We passed by Mabira forest on our way to Jinja - where an innocent Indian boy was killed by a mob protesting the government’s intentions to release a lot of the Mabira forest to an Indian company for tea plantations. Most of the tea plantations and other income-generating industries are controlled by Indians, and has instigated antagonism on the part of the Ugandans. The new foreign wealth controllers across the continent come from 2 areas of the world – Asia (China, Malaysia etc) and South Africa. Sometimes we do have to be realistic though – some of the foreigners have been with us for generations – so long that they’re Nigerian, Ghanaian, Kenyan etc like us in the sense that Africa – the country they grew up in is all they’ve known and called home. The only difference is that they may sit at the top of the socio-economic ladder 99% of the time. Mugabe can’t try to kick them out the way Amin did, or harass them in the manner he’s chosen. I do believe in redistributing the wealth that some of these wealthy families and companies have amassed, but it can definitely be cone more humanely.
One country we can learn from is Rwanda. Oh, and Botswana too. I have heard so much about Rwanda, and I’m really eager to go and visit. The discipline there is apparently incredible, and Kagame seems to be doing a great job. Perhaps not initially too straight (Ugandan entanglements, army connections etc), but he sure seems to be getting the country on its feet. Though I have not yet visited Rwanda, I use it as an example in my numerous ‘conscientization’ campaigns whenever I sit in taxis. I have adopted the strategy of moving the nation forward, one mind at a time, so I try to conscientize people I meet to do what is right and have an interest in seeing the nation do well. Many cab drivers I chat with have the common Ghanaian mentality that all good things dwell in the west – discipline, lack of corruption, etc etc. I now use Rwanda, sharing with them the fact that in Rwanda, the place is clean, and they enforce the law – if you litter the streets, you get fined or sent to ‘counterback’. They find it difficult to believe. I also tell them ‘wiase ye sum’ polythene bags have been outlawed, so there’s actually an AFRICAN nation that is taking the development agenda seriously and is moving forward. I always try to use my conscientization opportunities to share the good things happening in other parts of the continent (not easy to find, but possible).
Oh well! … overall, my trip to Uganda was good. It opened my eyes to a part of Africa I didn’t know, and taught me to appreciate Ghana with all its issues. More importantly, it really fueled my desire to return to that part of the continent – to Rwanda and Tanzania. This is my latest source of fascination. So! If you have a plane ticket to spare, do send it my way, and I’ll always be grateful for it. Hehehe. Take care, stay blessed and watch out for my journal from Ogyakrom proper! Ghana finds oil. Hmm. Walahi! United States of Africa? Ei! Does Brother Khaddafi have an ulterior agenda? Armed robberies in Accra, gender-based affirmative action and more … …
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