{UAH} Fwd: [gandatalk] Youth Leaders Say Aga Khan Joins the Cultural Genocide on Baganda

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Subject: Fwd: [gandatalk] Youth Leaders Say Aga Khan Joins the Cultural Genocide on Baganda

From: GandaTalk  <gandatalk@gandatalk.talklist.com>
Date: 27 January 2015 03:12:30 GMT+03:00
To: "GandaTalk" <gandatalk@gandatalk.talklist.com>
Subject: [gandatalk] Youth Leaders Say Aga Khan Joins the Cultural Genocide on Baganda
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https://www.bugandawatch.com/2015/01/24/youth-leaders-say-aga-khan-has-joined-the-cultural-genocide-against-baganda-people-in-uganda/

• Jan 24, 2015

Nationalist Baganda youth leaders are up in arms about what they call the decision by Prince Shah Karim Al Husseini Aga Khan IV to join the cultural genocide campaign against the Baganda people. They say that the Aga Khan has conspired with or bribed officials in Buganda Kingdom institutions to build a hospital and other business structures on the grounds of the sacred official residence of the Kabaka (king) called Mengo Lubiri.

For over a week, members of Baganda nationalist youth movement, Ffe Buganda Nze Buganda (We are Buganda I am Buganda) have been posting warnings on Facebook that Buganda and Uganda Government officials were feverishly negotiating a deal to bring the Aga Khan and members of his Nizari Ismailis Moslem sect into one of Buganda's most sacred cultural sites as business real-estate developers.  Suspicions are that members of the NRM ruling class are also using the Aga Khan as a trojan horse to get shares of the Lubiri. Wasswa Willy Ndigeza, Godfrey Luyombya, Victoria Namuli and Nicodemus Malimbolimbo are leading the Baganda youth protest against the alleged plans by the Aga Khan and his followers.

On Friday last week, one of the Ffe Buganda Nze Buganda leaders, Wasswa Willy Ndigeza, told BugandaWatch by phone in Luganda, "We hear that the Aga Khan is himself a spiritual leader and king like our Kabaka and has big palaces in England and elsewhere. But to us, he is like any other businessman who is working with our other enemies to do cultural genocide against Baganda. We don't think that his own officials can allow any foreign businessman to go and build a clinic or school in the compound of his palace. So why does he come through weak or greedy officials to buy and destroy our culture with his shops and billboards? I don't know but it is now starting to look like the people who say that Indians in Uganda hate Baganda may be correct."

It is common these days to hear traditional Baganda and youths in Kampala complaining that the Indians in Buganda have become central to the oppression of Baganda since they control nearly all business sectors but also discriminate against Baganda when hiring, because hiring a Munyankore helps a business to get contact in the Uganda tax authority (URA). There is also wide sentiments across traditional Baganda that the NRM government and its collaborators in Buganda institutions and elsewhere are following a long-term program of cultural genocide against Baganda. And that the burning of important cultural sites like Kasubi and other tomb sites, planting non-Baganda saboteurs in Mengo and isolating and misguiding Kabaka Mutebi is part of that genocide plan.

Research shows that the Asian community has historically been used as agents and collaborators of colonizing powers in Buganda and Uganda, starting in the early 1900's when British colonialists used them to keep native Baganda from entering commercial business. Over 10–20 years the NRM government has allowed thousands of Indians, Pakistanis and Sri Lankans to partner with non-Baganda Ugandans, especially from Western Uganda, to frustrate Baganda businessmen and women. The NRM government frequently gives away urban and Baganda native lands to so-called Indian investors, many of whom then expel Baganda residents to Kampala streets.

One of the reasons why many Baganda jubilated when Idi Amin expelled Indians and other Asians from Uganda in 1972 was because the president he overthrew, Milton Obote, had also used many of them to frustrate Baganda ambitions to grow in business. When the NRM government came into power, Baganda dominated business in Buganda and owned over 75% of all land in Buganda (counting the 9,000 square miles of native lands). Now Baganda control a smaller percentage of Buganda land than that in the hands of outsiders, especially from Western Uganda and foreign countries. In 1999 the NRM government outright stole and gave away 9,000 square miles of Baganda native lands to its supporters, collaborators and foreigners through the infamous 1998 Land Act.

In 2009 there was a major violent disturbance in Buganda, the Kayunga troubles, after the NRM government restricted the Kabaka from visiting Bugerere County of Buganda. Baganda youths clashed with Uganda Police and, at the end, 40 Baganda had been executed by the Uganda security forces. Many properties were destroyed but Asian businesses were not targeted by the crowds because they did not see their owners as a real enemy. It may be too early to tell how a decision by a high-profile Indian like the Aga Khan to finance the destruction of a sacred Baganda site like Mengo Lubiri will affect whether Baganda look at Indians as enemies or not.

Luyombya Godfrey • 3 hours ago

Obuluvvu bususe nnyo mubakulembeze baffe.The greedy & love for free money is now a habit in our leaders.

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