Tag Archives: rujumbura

Completing the list of supporters in Rujumbura as I grew up

While proving that I am not against Tutsi people, I mentioned as illustrations names of Tutsi who helped me as I grew up in Rujumbura County of Rukungiri district in southwest Uganda. Someone who is familiar with the people who helped me felt that I had left out another group that equally provided strong support and urged that I correct the record before the end of this year.

When I was growing up, community cohesion was very strong. A child belonged to the entire village. When you made a mistake you were warned by a neighbor not to repeat it, or else the matter would be reported to the parents. When you were hungry, a neighbor gave you food and vice versa. Children that were going to school and walked long distances received assistance along the way. From grade five to grade eight I walked a distance of some 20 miles to and from school, bare foot except those few days when I stayed with relatives nearer the school or father allowed me to use his bicycle.

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A message to voters in Rujumbura constituency

Next month (February 2011) you will exercise your right and elect a president, a member of parliament and district councilors for the next five years. The purpose of elections is to choose people that will represent the interests of all the people in their respective constituencies through for example building schools (and providing school lunches), hospitals and clinics, constructing roads, providing affordable energy, improving agriculture, storage and processing facilities. Representatives should implement development promises they make during campaigning time. When a representative does not deliver as promised he/she should not be re-elected.

Like other constituencies in Uganda, Rujumbura has had elections since 1961. For most of the time (some 95 percent) Rujumbura has been represented in parliament by Bashambo clan of Bahororo people.

By way of background information, Bahororo are Batutsi from Rwanda (not Bahima as previously thought. There are no Bahima in Rujumbura) who came to Rujumbura around 1800 as refugees when Bahima overran their short-lived Mpororo kingdom (after it had disintegrated) in present-day Ntungamo district. In collaboration with Arab slave traders who came with superior European weapons, Bahororo managed to defeat and enslave, exploit and marginalize Bantu people they found in the area. Bantu people who were dubbed Bairu (which means slaves) lost their short horn cattle and industrial enterprises. They were reduced to cultivators growing food for and providing free labor to the new masters in a master/serf relationship as existed in pre-colonial Rwanda and medieval Europe. Punishments were severe to prevent rebellions or when they occurred.

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Rujumbura was never part of short-lived Mpororo kingdom

In the beginning

Bantu people are believed to have left Nigeria/Cameroon border on massive and gradual migration about the time of Christ (R. W. July 1998). They entered the great lakes region about 2-3000 years ago. They entered Uganda through south west and/ or western corner. So they are the indigenous occupants of Rujumbura County (remnants of Bambuti are believed by some researchers to be Bantu people who adapted to a forest environment).

Bantu people brought with them short horn cattle, goats, sheep, poultry, crops and knowledge of iron technology (R. O. Collins 2006 & R. Oliver and G. Mathew vol. I 1963). They settled in good areas endowed with fertile and grazing land and iron ore. With iron technology (axes, machetes and hoes), they cleared land and grew a wide range of crops including bananas, grazed animals and manufactured a wide range of products based on resource endowment. They supplemented cultivated foodstuffs with plentiful wild game and fish, fruits and vegetables.

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Killing Kagunga won’t solve Rujumbura problems

The majority of people in Rujumbura county of Rukungiri district in southwest Uganda want a peaceful environment in which to grow up, raise their families and retire. The history of Rujumbura since 1800 has made it extremely difficult to create such a suitable environment because Bahororo minority ethnic group want to dominate Bairu forever. Bahororo think it is their God given right to suppress others with impunity whether they are educated or not. In fact the more you are educated and progressive the more you suffer under Bahororo because they want to send a discouraging message to those on the way up. They divide up family members favoring some with temporary inducements to dominate them.

The situation of Bairu turned a corner onto a very dangerous road when Bahororo deliberately incorporated Kagunga sub-county into Rukungiri municipality without consulting residents who are mostly Bairu. The principal intention of this incorporation is to finish off Bairu by rendering them landless and homeless. People without a home have no identity and could even be denied their rights.

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Southwest Uganda was already a colony when Britain arrived

When Bantu and Nilotic peoples met in northern, eastern, Buganda, Bunyoro and Toro they intermarried extensively and produced new communities and mixed economies of crop cultivation, herding and manufacturing. However, by the time the Nilotic Bahima (and later Batutsi under the new name of Bahororo) entered southwest Uganda (former Ankole district and Rujumbura county of Rukungiri district) they had decided against intermarriage with Bantu people and against allowing Bantu to own cattle as a form of capital accumulation. Nilotic Bahima and Bahororo people who were more powerful militarily but less advanced economically than Bantu chose to colonize the latter. By and large, colonization involves the colonizer depriving the colonized of their properties, disrupting their economic structures and imposing taxes or tribute in exchange for unsolicited law and order or protection.

For easy reference we need to know that before Nilotic people arrived in what later became southwest Uganda some six hundred years ago, Bantu people had developed dynamic and viable economic structures and systems that combined wild hunting, fishing and gathering, crop cultivation, livestock herding (short-horn cattle, goats and sheep) poultry rearing and manufacturing a wide range of products mostly based on iron ore. Food surplus and specialization had permitted the emergence of a ruling class of kings and chiefs or council of elders and a form of centralized governance system and diplomatic relations among different communities. In short, Bantu were civilized.

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Why Bairu are encouraged to marry Bahima women

The issue of intermarriage has been in Uganda media for quite some time now and it is increasingly providing vital information following Phionah Kesaasi’s article which appeared in the Observer (Uganda) in April 2010. Kesaasi argued that Bairu men marry Bahima, Batutsi and Bahororo women because they are more beautiful than Bairu women and there was nothing to be ashamed of. Ipso facto, Bahima men do not marry Bairu women because they are less beautiful than Bahima women, implying there was nothing to apologize about. She added that traditionally when a man marries, he favors in-laws than his relatives. These two remarks generated a storm of criticism and many questions.

Earlier Ephraim Kamuhangire had written in response to my article “Why Rujumbura’s Bairu are impoverished” that in Rujumbura Bairu elite had married so many Bahororo women that there was no way a political uprising of Bairu peasants against Bahororo domination would succeed implying that Bairu elite would join their in-laws and crush such attempts. Therefore Bahororo’s indefinite domination of Bairu was very secure. By the way in my article referred to above I never raised the issue of intermarriage. Kamuhangire picked it out of the hat to make a point that Bairu have no chance of ever controlling the political game in Rujumbura. Since that time I have reflected on what he and Kesaasi wrote.

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Rujumbura history must not be repeated

I was trained in and have practiced the art of diplomacy at the highest level in international relations. Simply put diplomacy includes the art of establishing contacts through which problems are solved in a subtle manner or behind-the-scenes if you will. When circumstances force me to speak or to write I have used language – body, spoken or literary – to convey messages without divulging sensitive details or naming names.

As mentioned elsewhere I have studied the history of the Great Lakes Region especially my home area of Rujumbura for over forty years. I have read extensively and listened carefully to oral stories. Because I did not get much information from using questionnaires, I decided to use other techniques including travelling by bus between Uganda’s capital city of Kampala and my home town of Rukungiri – a decision that frustrated many people particularly my relatives because as a senior United Nations staff member I was not expected to travel that way.

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Similarities in suffering between Rujumbura’s Bairu and Indigenous peoples

The indigenous peoples from all over the world are meeting (April 2010) at the United Nations headquarters in New York City. For the last six years I have attended their meetings. I have listened carefully to their stories and read their publications. Their common theme has been land that has economic and spiritual value. They are therefore trying to hang on to what is left and to utilize it according to their priorities. But they are facing daunting challenges from global demands. Their stories about the negative impact of losing their land are similar to what Rujumbura’s Bairu are experiencing as they lose more land to newcomers. I will compare the experiences of the two groups, draw conclusions and propose corrective actions.

The story of Indigenous people in the Great Lakes Region

Before Bantu-speaking people arrived in the area some 3000 years ago, the Great Lakes Region was occupied by indigenous people (the term ‘indigenous’ has not been accepted by governments in the region because it is considered divisive and the term ‘Pygmy’ has been rejected by indigenous people because it has derogatory meaning). For the purpose of this article, I will use indigenous people for lack of a better term.

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Clearing the fog around Bahororo story in Rujumbura

Many readers have contacted and thanked me for the commendable work I am doing on Bahororo story. They think, however, that I have not done enough to explain who lived in Rujumbura and what they did before 1800 when Bahororo led by Bashambo clan under the leadership of Rwebiraro arrived in search of a new home 60-90 years after the disintegration of Mpororo kingdom which covered parts of southwest Uganda and northern Rwanda.

In Uganda Bahima, under the leadership of Bahinda clan, replaced Bahororo and renamed Bairu (slaves) or commoners the people they took over from Bahororo who had been called Bahororo – the people of Mpororo. Bahororo who founded Mpororo kingdom were Batutsi from Rwanda. So when they founded Mpororo all the people who had been living in the area and known by their clan names became Bahororo.

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