{UAH} BUWEMBO: EA federation -Let's start with the gorillas, move on to the fish, oil etc
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BUWEMBO: EA federation -Let's start with the gorillas, move on to the fish, oil etc
Posted Saturday, August 9 2014 at 12:40
In Summary
- We all know how the realisation of a full East African federation is difficult to achieve mainly because of divergent political perceptions amongst the five member states. So we could start by passing some territories that have shared resources to the East African Community to administer.
Late last month, Ugandan immigration paraded 38 foreigners working in the country illegally. Fortunately, none of them was East African, or even African for that matter. Maybe the folly of the arbitrarily borders drawn in Berlin is finally being ignored with the contempt it deserves.
The same week as the 38 were being arraigned, Joshua Kiprui Cheptegei was winning the 10,000 metres gold at the IAAF world junior championships.
Like Stephen Kiprotich, Uganda's sensational Olympics Marathon champion who at the London Games of 2012 paused before the finishing line to pick up his national flag before resuming the race and still win, Cheptegei is from our Sabiny community, whose kinsmen in Kenya are called Kalenjin. Just imagine if all the Kips and Cheps were running under one flag, how formidable would their team be in world athletics events!
Then I think of the Maasai, firmly divided by the colonial border between Kenya and Tanzania. As a community, I don't know if the Maasai have much say in the administration of their original lands of Arusha and Nairobi.
If only Tanzania and Kenya would elect ethnic Maasais to the presidency, maybe the childish (but economically weighty) bickering over who should sell Kilimanjaro to the world as a tourist attraction would cease. At least the wildebeest and zebras have refused to apply for passports before they move around their natural home that some British and German land grabbers divided with a straight line as if there were no natural features along the way.
The same land grabbers were also water grabbers, and drew their straight lines across Lake Victoria, creating the current mess of Migingo island, putting its land in Kenya and its water in Uganda. Imagine if Lake Victoria were under one political authority, it would be much better managed and would today possibly be put on the one-year fishing holiday that it badly requires.
The reckless Berlin map drawers caused the same confusion all over the region. Today, easily the most-expensive-to-view tourist attraction on the continent is the mountain gorillas. Their home was arbitrarily divided among Rwanda, Uganda and Congo. So you can imagine the bureaucratic cacophony involved in touring the entire colony.
Rwandans these days jokingly boast that most of the gorilla families (led by silverback male elders) have chosen to settle on the Rwanda side because it is more comfortable there, with better food, care and love from the authorities.
And as you may be aware, the oil fields under Lake Albert of Western Uganda are the same as those of eastern Congo. So expect some quarrels out there in the years to come.
But there is a way such quarrels, like the ones over the Migingo fish and Mount Kilimanjaro, can be eliminated and instead these features turned to everybody's advantage.
We all know how the realisation of a full East African federation is difficult to achieve mainly because of divergent political perceptions amongst the five member states.
So we could start by passing some territories that have shared resources to the East African Community to administer. The federation government can keep taking over more territory as East Africans get used to the idea of a shared government. The process can be slowed down or sped up depending on the objective circumstances of the day.
Joachim Buwembo is a Knight International Fellow for development journalism. E-mail: buwembo@gmail.com
Democracy is two Wolves and a Lamb voting on what to have for lunch. Liberty is a well-armed Lamb contesting the results.
Benjamin FranklinUAH forum is devoted to matters of interest to Ugandans. Individuals are responsible for whatever they post on this forum.To unsubscribe from this group, send email to: ugandans-at-heart+unsubscribe@googlegroups.com or Abbey Semuwemba at: abbeysemuwemba@gmail.com.
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