{UAH} Simon okurut: How can tribalism be controlled in Uganda? Any suggestions?

---------- Forwarded message ---------
From: Abbey Semuwemba <abbeysemuwemba@gmail.com>
Date: Tue, 4 Aug 2020, 18:33
Subject: {UMBS} Simon okurut: How can tribalism be controlled in Uganda? Any suggestions?
To: Uganda Brothers and Sisters <uganda-muslim-brothers-and-sisters@googlegroups.com>
Cc: Jonny Rubin <jnnyrubin@yahoo.co.uk>

Shared:

My name is Daniel Tumwine. 

I am being accused of being "arrogant", "long nosed", "privileged"... and being told "we shall get you when Museveni falls". All virtue of the second name I carry. 

I was born in flat 667 Buganda Road, Kampala, Uganda. 

A child of parents persecuted for their profession and beliefs, I grew up a diaspora kid, on a 400m stretch of bent road in Zimbabwe where 7 other Ugandan exile families lived. 

The only identity I knew then was that together with the Ogaa's, the Kiire's, the Ndikuwera's, the Okello's, the Mayanja's and many such kids who lived on that stretch of road in Harare, we were Ugandan. Our exiled parents held home party's every Sunday to instil a sense of pride in our country, in our flag, in our regalia. 

I speak halting Runyankole. My Luganda is better than my Rukiga. I speak better Shona than Rutooro. I speak even better English. But the language I try to be most fluent in is love. 

My mother is buried in Mbale, the land of her ancestors. A daughter of a proud dynasty. A lady who refused to be defined by the confines of her ethnicity and dared marry outside her tribal boundaries. 

And yet, my name -my identity; the imprint of my signature; the label of my unborn child; the only word I have answered to from birth, from foes, from family and from friends alike... the embodiment of my DNA-  is being interpreted as an avatar of all that is vile and despicable in Uganda. 

It has been scapegoated. 

My very existence - my hopes, my struggles, my fears, my anger, my sins, my broken dreams, my mournings, my triumphs- has been reduced to a synonym for arrogance, for undeserved achievement, for privilege.  

I live, not because of, but despite of the State.

 

I'm the State's most acerbic critic. I have gained nothing from its machinery having surnames similar to mine. And, despite opportunities presenting themselves, I do not feel the need to do so. 

My sense of justice does not allow me to consciously benefit from a regime that has its majority citizens unable to afford good quality health care and good quality education. 

Yet, my closest mates, and those I admire most serving in this government are mostly from places other than the west. 

Similarly, the most arrogant personalities in this government such as the incredulous Kibuule's, the Majjes of Anite's, the convoy knocking pedestrians of Justine Lumumba... they can hardly be called westerners. 

I do not employ family or friends. No. That's a lie. I employ only one family member. She is there purely on merit. And I only discovered we were related years after we employed her.  Similarly, those who work for me and share similar sounding surnames as mine are measured by the same yardstick as everyone else; character, discipline and competence. 

On many occasions I've been accused of 'arrogance' by clans for not putting my tribes mates first. My family first. My relative first. 

I owe any success I may modestly claim to a muganda teacher, a munyankole lady, a mugisu mother, a mukiga father, an acholi benefactor and a philanthropist best friend whose tribe I embarrassingly dont even know. 

Yet, here I am, today, being caricatured as arrogant and privileged. Unfeeling. Unempathetic.  

If I appear arrogant, it must be because of my proud gishu bloodline. If I am privileged it is because of my parent's good fortune in meeting in the 70's. If I am unfeeling and unempathetic, I will not blame anyone, but me. Not my tribe, not my upbringing, not my school. But me. An individual trait that should not be generalised. 

I have no problem if you demonize me as Daniel. But the  demonisation of all Tumwine's and peoples as a whole must stop. 

Our neighbours down south know that it never ends well.

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