UGANDA: A CLEAR AND PRESENT DANGER LOOMING

The most beautiful place in Uganda I have been to is the Kyenjojo, Fort Portal, and the Rwenzori Areas. The West Nile region too is Romantically beautiful. I also travelled to a place in Sezibwa area that had one of the most amazing forest drives I have had in a long time; the air too was so fresh that I wished I could stay. Someone coined the phrase "Uganda: Gifted by nature!" and they surely did not lie. I have been to a few African countries and struggle to find a country that is physically and climatically as beautiful as Uganda. The land is also endowed with all forms of picturesque beauty that if one wanted a fair taste of Great Africa they had better come to Uganda. No wonder it is called “The Pearl of Africa.”

Also, almost all foods and fruits grow here. Being raised here I took it for granted that variety of foods is something all peoples of the world are blessed with; it took me to travel not so far from Uganda as a grown-up man to understand that I was terribly wrong! But all this could most likely be grabbed away from us, if we are not careful to stop the growing trend, in not so a long time from now!

If you have not noticed, the rainfall patterns have been pretty unpredictable. That can be painful for farmers who can no longer reliably pinpoint seasons. The planting seasons have been shifting indeterminately and harvesting seasons too have been impacted leading in some cases to economic losses. Some friends and I tried to dig a well in Nalutuntu Sub-county in Mubende 4 years ago; the experienced diggers had to stop when they hit 150feet underground due to lack of oxygen, but still no water! We abandoned that project and thought we needed to try technology. The well digger truck we hired picked its spot where they said they were sure of water; two tries yielded nothing, and off they went with millions of monies already paid to them and no results on water! Eventually we were told by the locals that no one has been successful in that venture in this area so far (atleast by then). We resorted to laying pipes and pumping water from the only available private dam 1Km away nearby our project.

One does not have to look far to see things happening around us that leave true environmentalists shivering with fear. What is scary is that Uganda’s Forest Cover is still significantly receding more than it is being replenished to the tune of 100Ha/Yr compared to 150Ha/10Yrs replenishment (Ref. New Vision 17th Oct. 2017). Some investors have tried to fight back by growing trees and forests however despite all these initiatives, Uganda’s forests are faced with continuously worsening trends through encroachment, deforestation and forest degradation through conversion of forest land to other land uses. These include agriculture, urbanization and rampant felling of trees for timber, firewood and charcoal burning on private and government land, rampant fires and livestock damage on forest plantations. More specifically, one report states that the country lost on average 122,000 ha/year of forest every year from 1990-2015. The greatest loss in the country is estimated at 250,000 ha of forests annually according to NFA estimates for the period 2005-2010. On the other hand, on average, only about 7,000 hectares of planted forests are established on a yearly basis in the last 15 years. (Ref. MINISRTY OF WATER AND ENVIRONMENT STATE OF UGANDA’S FORESTRY 2015 THE REPUBLIC OF UGANDA MINISRTY OF WATER AND ENVIRONMENT STATE OF UGANDA’S FORESTRY 2016). Clearly, we are not doing very well. My primary school science tells me the rainfall cycle depends on both trees and water bodies.

Now turning to the latter, water bodies! We have been told by geographers that East Africa has the second biggest freshwater lake in the world, the Lake Victoria. There is many other smaller freshwater lakes in Uganda through out the land. A close look at it though reveals that all these water bodies are interlinked somehow; Victoria, kyoga, Edward, Nile valley, etc. This means that when one chocks others will eventually follow suit. However, Lake Victoria is under threat already, under assault from the activity around it. I have watched with great horror over the last 30 years as the swamps around Lake Victoria have swiftly disappeared making way to various economic activities and developments.

A close look also reveals that settlements around the lake have aggressively take over and now activities are happening with reckless abandon right up to the lake side; the result - silting of the lake. Plastics clog the channels and eventually end up in the lake, human wastewater, herbicide, and chemicals infested runoff water from Flower farms on lake shores, cutting of vegetation on the shorelines and so much more. Lately my water bill has gone up into the uncomfortable zone even when the consumption has not and its no wonder why.

The rate and trend of destruction and abuse of these forests and water bodies is now imposing an ever-increasing risk on us all; so this is no longer a concern for just the environmentalists but for all Ugandans. Slow but sure desertification and related Land pressure as the population grows, which means that food and water pressure increases and eventually with-it competition for the same. To put it plainly, all this is a budding serious national crisis and security issue. For Uganda right now the environment in my view is the most critical national priority which if we do not radically pay attention to will speak a language of its own, screaming back at us in ways that we shall not be able to deal with. People must immediately stop the indiscriminate cutting down of trees and as well we must engage in an aggressive drive to replant forests in order to increase our carbon footprint. National Forest reserves must be restored, and older species replanted too together with the fast growing one's.

The lake shores must be recovered back from private ownership and protective vegetation restored and as well actions to desilt the lakes taken. The swamps, all of which play a critical filtering role must be restored and all encroachment pushed back to old boundaries. We must aggressively enforce environmental laws and criminalize environmental abuse and as well push environmental restoration to the homestead level. Lastly, we must employ valley Dams and water harvesting plus irrigation schemes in order to utilize to the maximum the rainfall we are still so blessed to receive as a nation.

Unless we take to these aggressive paranoid measures and more, environmental degradation in Uganda is a clear and present danger which if not addressed immediately, will force upon us the abundant harvest that yields from this kind of abuse. And nothing will stop the immense collateral damage that shall arise from this; and no one shall be spared.

I kid you not!

THE SILENT WORLD WAR!

I grew up in Uganda during the tumultuous 1980s where you didn’t have to be at fault to be hit by a stray bullet coming from any fracas started by anyone at any time. One time whilst in my primary 3 class, we heard gun shots outside a bit far off from the school. A few seconds afterward, Stephen my neighbor to the right, on the same desk, was hit by something swift; he fell. its only when we saw blood that we knew something had gone terribly wrong! He survived by a whisker as the bullet only glanced his skull and took off a chuck of flesh on his head. So, I totally understand the meaning of the phrase "stray bullet".

In those times basic military safety protocol was tutored into us; if you hear gun shots take cover, do not peer through windows at night, avoid scenarios of chaos wherever you see them, etc. All this became second nature to us to date.

I recall one day (I was 10 years old at the time) as I walked back from school, a pickup truck loaded with Special Forces troops just pulled up swiftly beside me at the road, the soldiers jumped off and made a quick formation and then started offloading their AK47 rifles into the horizon, apparently "in pursuit" of an errant colleague. Nothing like the sound of ten AK47s going off in automatic fire at a go! that was some explosion. I cannot tell you how I ended up in a very safe place behind a big tree, but I can attest to the fact that I dived, hit the deck and rolled. When I came to, I was safely tucked away behind this huge tree 15 meters away.

In those days you could not behave like life was normal. No one convinced you of curfew, told you to to be indoors early and lock up your house or reminded you to follow safety protocols. As a child I saw so many corpses on the streets almost on a daily basis I became immune to them. However, you ignored those SOPs to your own peril. In fact, you were considered a mad man if you started running towards the direction of Gun shots instead of further away from them.

The world is at war right now. There is a World War raging right now. This world war is more subtle but possibly more dangerous than the other two before it. People have died by the thousands daily and continue to die across the globe. What I notice about this war is that it puts you so much at ease even when danger is looming right around your own corner; and that is how many have taken the hit! Many have died and many more will die until the world adjusts to basic protocols for safety. I notice my dear country Uganda is in serious trouble too from this war too.

From piecing up numerous versions of its origins, Covid19 is a weaponised virus. Only evil minds come up with such stuff and evil intent must be presumed on how Covid19 was "accidentally " released into humanity; no one though ever comes up to a firm conclusion on how this "accident" happened. There are some constants in the Covid19 story though; a bunch of American scientists, a city called Wuhan in far East China, and an "accident" at a Chinese lab in Wuhan.

There has been lots of conspiracy theories around Covid19 that it would be unwise to think that all is well; the smoke is simply too much for one to ignore. So, following my simple logic, if we presume that this is a weapon that was "accidentally" deployed, why do we keep behaving like all around us concerning this disease is normal? Why do we not exercise precaution? It is high time we behaved like this is the war that it is. No one in war time goes about hanging out whilst bombs fly over head and keep indiscriminately landing on civilian targets. 

Some key things though to take note of even in war time: The Economy must continue to grow else other gory stuff kicks in; health services must continue as these are the very lifeline of society during the war, and life must go on but definitely cannot remain the same as it was in the beginning. My concern is that people in Uganda keep behaving as though Covid19 is a common cold. A lot has been said about the SOPs but it is alarming how these are breached even by those that are educated enough to read and follow the international news reports; those that can see the carnage of Covid19 almost first hand. Until we begin to treat the Covid19 situation as the war that it is, a lot of our loved ones as a people shall leave us before their time.

I have interacted with lots of people who somehow think it is an act of valiance to defy Covid19 by not following the SOPs; those who think it is an act of weakness. Fine, it is your right to die before your time but do not take others with you who are innocent. If you must defy SOPs, do it in your own private space, but for the sake of those others around you align to the recommended guidelines. Strangely, this disease can be transmitted by asymptomatic persons who then carry it to unsuspecting innocent people that get badly hit. A number of people have been affected this way. Also, as a society we must accept that certain rituals around the dead belong to the past where in respect to what this sneaky enemy Covid19 can do, we must ensure to bury our dead without much fanfare. I have heard a few stories of infections that have happened around funeral vigils leading to further deaths that were not warranted.

I have also heard some folks from a religious perspective who think exercising precautions against Covid19 is a lack of faith in God and His salvation. As a pastor I notice so much troubling presumption among parishioners around this disease even when we sound warnings tirelessly at the pulpit about it. Until similar precautions were followed in the days of pandemics in the past, many men and women of faith were lost to these merciless diseases. Others think exercising precautions is expensive; to those I will say try catching the disease and we compare notes and see which weighs you down more.

We can make this disease get down on its knees and finally knock it out, but it is going to take everyone believing that we are at war, and our enemy is merciless and indiscriminate on whom they knock out. Our enemy Covid19 has nothing to lose, and the sooner we figure this out, the better for us all.

We are at war!!! Wake up and exercise due precautions.