Dear Hon. Balaam Barugahara Ateenyi,
Thank you for coming to Buliisa district as a special guest for the Omujaato Disco Night on the evening of Monday, June 10, 2024.
I understand that it was your first visit to the land of Bugungu since you were appointed the Minister of State for Youth and Children Affairs and Vice Chairperson of the Patriotic League of Uganda, Western Region. Congratulations, Sir! Next time, please come to Bugungu during the daytime.
In our culture, we don’t sweep the house at night, and a visitor who comes in darkness is believed to bring bad luck. Good visitors come in broad daylight when everyone can see what they are carrying in their hands.
That said, the Omujaato Disco Night had been advertised for the past two months as the Bunyoro Kitara Cultural Institution pre-empango party with promises of free meat, beer, musicians, fireworks, and a full-blast disco.
But early on Monday, June 10, 2024, I saw the Buliisa district PLU mobilizers getting involved to sanction all PLU members to attend the Omujaato Disco Night. This left some PLU members confused. Balaam Events’ disco truck had arrived in Buliisa town ahead of time, as early as Sunday afternoon, to wait for you. I am not sure if your coming represented the interests of the Uganda government, PLU, Bivulu promoter, or if you were acting in multiple capacities.
Regardless of whose interests you represented, it was quite disturbing and morally regrettable that, as a Minister of Youth and Children Affairs, from whom we expect special planning, guidance, and good opportunities for our youth and children, you found pleasure in partnering with Bunyoro Kitara to sponsor free beer, fireworks, meat, and an all-night disco on a Monday when our youth were supposed to be sober enough to go to work the next Tuesday morning and our children were supposed to go to school. Is alcoholism and a sleepless night on a weekday the best offer you could afford for our youth and children?
Do you know how many children missed school on Tuesday, June 11, 2024, because they escaped from their parents’ home and joined the all-night disco on a school night? Do you know how many in boarding schools will be suspended because they escaped to come and dance at the Omujaato Disco Night after they heard Gravity Omutujju sing into their ears through the far-reaching bass speakers of the Balaam Events sound system that unsettled them during their study time? Hon. Minister, do you wish for all our children to grow into street performers who will always dance on stages to give revelers a vibe? Is this what you wish for our children as their Minister?
Sir, if you had come during the daytime, we would have sat you under the mango tree and told you that the oil-rich Buliisa district has no vocational training center for the youth who finish Primary Seven or Secondary Four and are unable to further their education.
We would have told you that the district is struggling to mobilize money through the community to start one called Kirama Vocational Centre so that our youth can be skilled. In fact, the money spent on Omujaato freebies would have bought tailoring machines for Kirama Vocational Centre.
Hon. Minister, most of the youth in Buliisa work in the Tilenga Project, especially at the Central Processing Facility from Monday to Saturday as steel fixers (casual laborers). These are the only jobs that were reserved for the indigenous communities.
They leave their homes before 6:00 am and return home around 11:00 pm, working in scorching sunshine for as little as 700,000 shillings per month. Do you know how many of those youth missed work the next day because they were drunk and fatigued during Omujaato Disco Night and will have their monthly payments deducted for missing a day?
Hon. Minister, I heard your DJ play songs like ‘Twalya ko zitwalya’ by Elly Wamala. The youth you saw buying beer are given short-term contracts of no more than a year in the Tilenga Project area and forced to work desperately under gross violations of workers’ rights. They work overtime (60 hours a week) contrary to the 56 hours in their contracts, thus being cheated out of about 4 hours of pay. Some are demobilized after the six months of probation, and others have their contracts terminated without any notice or terminal benefits.
Those youth, because they have attempted to fight for their rights in the past, have been threatened and categorized as lazy, unruly, undisciplined, and generally unemployable by Tilenga subcontractors and are being targeted for small mistakes. Do you know dancing at Omujaato Disco Night may cause some to lose their work? Have you ordered the PAU to order Total to ensure all Tilenga subcontractors exempt punishment for all those who missed work due to the Omujaato hangover?
Are you aware that most of those youth who drank Omujaato beer are semi-skilled workers in the Tilenga project, whose statutory deductions like NSSF are made but not remitted to their accounts until the end of their contracts? Are you aware that most of them came to dance at Omujaato Disco Night with company medical cards in their pockets without premiums on them? Are you aware of that fraud? Hon. Minister of Youth Affairs, did you bring the disco so they can dance and forget these sad realities?
Is it part of your psychosocial therapy to improve their mental health? Sir, I hope you understand that for any country to progress, it needs a productive youthful population. Did Gravity Omutujju, while on that tall stage singing his famous song ‘Kwepica,’ give tips to our youth about work ethics and saving to invest? Did they not drink all they had saved when he sang, ‘Embuzi Zakutude’?
Hon. Minister, I saw you force revelers to clap for the Bunyoro Kitara Cultural Institution. Please tell them and their Prince Kintu Samuel Harrison Gafabusa not to grab the land in Kitigo, Bubwe, Kahoona, Kalengeja B, in Busingiro Parish, Biiso Sub County in Buliisa district.
Many of the children who call you their minister know those four villages as their only home, where their childhood and dreams reside. I saw in the New Vision of Tuesday, April 30, 2024, Bunyoro Kitara Cultural Institution informing the public that the land in those villages belongs to them.
I also saw a letter dated June 5, 2024, from the Office of the Commissioner Land Registration declaring the same land to belong to Prince Kintu Samuel Harrison Gafabusa.
There is a rumor that those two are fighting for ownership of the land and that one of them wants to remove people to grow sugarcane. God forbid! I hope it is just a rumor. Those people gave away the Bugoma forest reserve to sugarcane investors. The people are scared. That land belongs to our ancestors who protected it with their blood.
Hon. Minister, Bunyoro Kitara Cultural Institution can come and dance Omujaato for ten nights and slaughter 100 cows, but please, they should stay away from the land in Buliisa. They should stay away from the land in Kabolwa. They should stay away from the land in Biiso. They should stay away from the land in Buliisa town.
When it comes to our land, we will urinate all the free beer and forget all the meat and curse them naked. We will go to Buswa and summon the anger of our ancestors. We can tolerate everything but an attack on our land. Our land is our life.
I will not tell you about the news of the Bagungu seeking their independent cultural institution. That one, I know you are aware of, and the reason Omujaato was brought to the land of Bugungu for the first time in history is rumored to be to undermine those efforts.
I hope you are not part of those supporting efforts to suppress the God-given rights of the Bagungu to be identified as Bagungu. Bagungu have been blocked two times from organizing their cultural dance event, aka Kabbari, at the ground where Omujaato happened on Monday. Letters have been written in the past from Bunyoro Kitara to block Bagungu from dancing their dance in their land.
The people of Bugungu are grateful to the office of the IGP and the Ministry of Gender, Labor, and Social Development. They have always lawfully cleared the Bagungu cultural dance events for the last two years. Did you have a chance to enjoy Kaliwa, Muzenyo, Kikwela, or Kwadda dances during Omujaato Disco Night?
Thank you for reading my long letter.
The author is Byaruhanga Nelson, an indigenous journalist, writer, and filmmaker.
