Birth of Kibuli as a religion, education hub

The mosque on top of Kibuli Hill. To further improve the education of the Muslim community, Badru Kakungulu gave 80 acres to Kibuli as a site for a Mosque and location for schools. PHOTO BY STEPHEN OTAGE

What you need to know:

  • History. It is one of the original seven hills that made Kampala the city of seven hills. Its creation was as a result of the need to create space for the growing European and Asian population in Kampala. This week we trace the origin of Kibuli from a killing ground to a prominent religious, educational and historical hill in Kampala.

South of Kampala Industrial Area and east of the police training school lies the Kibuli Hill and its community. By 1969, it was one of the rapidly growing areas of Kampala with an annual population growth of about 13 per cent.

The founding
The history of this place starts with the signing of the 1900 Buganda Agreement when the leader of the Muslim community in Buganda then, Prince Nuhu Mbogo, was given 24sq miles for him and his followers. This was an exceptional grant of land within the kibuga [city] at that time to one individual.

Under the agreement, chiefs were getting not more than nine acres of land within the kibuga. At the time of signing the agreement, the Muslim community power in Buganda was diminishing. This followed the religious wars in which the Christians drove the only Muslim king, Kalema, out of Buganda. He later died of smallpox as he fled towards Bunyoro. Muslims chose Mbogo as their Kabaka.

Mbogo was born in 1835 to Kabaka Suna. Mbogo and his Muhammaden followers were in 1891 attacked by a joint force of then Kabaka Mwanga and colonial administrator Frederick Lugard’s troops. The defeated Mbogo and his followers settled in a predominantly Muslim area of Butambala and dropped his claim to the kabakaship. However, on the insistence of Lugard, Mbogo was brought to stay near Kampala. His camp was at present-day Kampala Road where Crane Chambers stands.

Writing in the Uganda Chronicles of 1894, Hodder and Stoughton say “Christian missionaries promoted an impression that Baganda Muslims were more loyal to Mbogo than to the Kabaka.” Their assertion was supported by Gitkind in his book The Royal Capital of Buganda and Katumba and Welbourm who in the Uganda Journal volume 28 of 1964 says, “Baganda Muslim, in fact, were often referred to as distinct or foreign to other Baganda.”

Following the 1893 Muslim uprising, Mbogo was exiled by the British to Zanzibar for three years. One year after his return, he refused to co-operate with the mutinying Sudanese soldiers who had pledged to restore him as kabaka for his support. His stand with the British during the mutiny was rewarded with the recognition as the leader of the Muslim community in Uganda. On top of that, he went ahead to play a key role in the 1900 Buganda Agreement. Despite that, he was kept under surveillance by British officials.

With the European and Indian population increasing in the kibuga, land became scarce. Mbogo and his followers were forced to relocate from Nakasero to Kibuli. Though it was a huge chunk of land, what it had in size it lacked in location.

Writing in the Uganda Journal volume 34 of 1970, Regina .M. Solbacher, a social researcher at Makerere University, said “Kibuli was cut off from Kampala by the Nakivubo swamp and from Mengo by the Kayunga swamp. To go to Mengo from Kibuli one had to go all the way south of Nsambya.”

Regina goes on to say, “It was not until the swamps were drained in the 1930’s that Nsambya road connecting Kibuli to Mengo could be built and not until 1950 that Press House road connecting Kibuli with industrial area was built.”

Mbogo’s first house on Kibuli Hill was a traditional thatched house which was replaced in 1914 with a wooden two-storied house curved like the coastal structures. It was from here that with the aid of his aide in chief Masudi Kisasa administered the affairs of the Muslim community in Uganda until his death in 1921. He was succeeded by his 14-year-old son Badru Kakungulu who became the leader of the Muslim community.

Becoming an educational centre
A year after Mbogo’s death, Kibuli went through a number of changes. One of the significant changes was the creation of a school on the hill. The school in Kibuli was born out of concern by both the British and Mengo administrators that the young Badru Kakungulu was being schooled only in Arabic and Islamic studies.

Before then, there were no Muslim schools in Buganda Kingdom that were offering Western education. According to Regina, the absence of Muslim schools teaching Western curricula was due to the absence of Muslim missionaries like the case for Christianity.

In 1922, a decision was taken by the Lukiiko [parliament] to start a Western-style curricular based primary school in Kibuli. This marked the start of Western type of education in the Muslim community in Buganda and Uganda as a whole.

Page three of The Uganda Herald of February 23, 1944, reported about the starting of the school saying, “The first three pupils of Kiwotoka Primary School were Badru Kakungulu, H. Golooba, and A. W. Simbwa with Luka Sajjabi as their teacher met in a small mud structure.”
By 1925, when Prince Kakungulu joined King’s College Budo, the school had evolved from a mud built school to a baked brick walled school and was admitting both Muslim and non-Muslim pupils from within and outside Kibuli community. The founding of Kiwokota Primary school marked the beginning of Kibuli becoming a centre of Muslim education.

During the golden jubilee of the Ismalia community in East Africa in 1937, the head of the community, His Highness the Aga Khan, created the East Africa Muslim Welfare Association for which Kakungulu was appointed vice president.

Writing in the book A Crisis of Nationhood Ingrams H, says “It was through this association bringing together prosperous Ismalia community that funds to develop Muslim education in the country were raised.”

It was during the same year that Rahmadan Gova, Kakungulu’s classmate at Kibuli, returned as a teacher, and according to Regina, Rahmadan’s return was a turning point to Muslim education in Uganda. He formed the Uganda Muslim Education Association (UMEA) as a way of getting government sponsorship.

“Seeing that government would help sponsor Muslim school only when the religious community formed a registered education body …the association was registered in 1940,” says Regina.
To further improve the education of the Muslim community, Kakungulu gave 80 acres to Kibuli as a site for a Mosque and location for schools. Therefore, Kibuli was never an allotment to the Muslims like other faiths but a grant from an individual. During the 1900 Buganda Agreement, the Muslims were never given land like it was the case for the Christians.

The construction of the mosque started immediately but it was not until 1945 when secondary education started at the Kibuli Hill and a hostel was opened for students coming far from the school. Writing about the education of African Muslims in the Uganda Journal volume 29 of 1963, Carter F. says, “A grade C teacher training college at Kasawa began by the Buganda government as a model school in 1932-3 was given to the Muslim community who moved it to its present site in Kibuli where it became Kibuli Muslim Teachers Training School.

Growth of Kibuli population
In an easy in Economic Development and Tribal Change titled “A History of Migration in Uganda” by P.G Powesland, he says: “Because of limited educational opportunities for Muslims, there was little inducement for Baganda Muslims to come to town to settle. The uneducated Muslim farmer could do better in the rural area growing cotton as a cash crop than he could do as a manual labourer in Kampala.”
Powesland goes on to say, “By 1900, a considerable number of migrants from Ankole, Tooro and Bunyoro had come to Buganda in search for work. Some of these migrants started filtering into Kibuli.”
By the time the first migrants moved into Kibuli, settling along the road going past Mbogo’s house to Nsambya, the area was mainly an agricultural area. A number of events happening outside Kibuli had drastic effects on the future of the ecology and population of Kibuli.

Port Bell-Kampala railway line
The events started with the opening of the Port Bell-Kampala railway line in 1915. This line went past he northern part of Kibuli. A year later, Kampala Municipality bought land below Kibuli for the construction of the police barracks.

Another event was the plan by then chief municipality planner E. A. Mirams in 1930 presented a plan for the future of the municipality planning. In his 1930 presentation titled, report on the town planning and development of Kampala, he suggested locating the industrial estate directly north of Kibuli since the Kampala-Jinja railway was to open there parallel to the Port Bell line. He further suggested that because of its location, Kibuli should be used for building houses for the working class.”

During the 1930’s, Wabigalo, part of Kibuli, also started to be carved out. It was started mainly by Banyankole, and Banyoro settlers who were later joined by Batooro. These were soon joined by some Basamia who came with the railway, making the population of Kibuli heterogeneous compared to the rest of Kampala and its surroundings.

1949 was a year for Kibuli’s rapid growth. As a result of the increased population of Europeans and Asian communities, it was decided that Kololo Hill be developed. According to a 1947 report titled “A report on the extension scheme Kololo-Naguru” by May .E. he states: “Though Kololo had become part of Kampala in 1919, it had never been developed, but when the 1949 development plan for Kololo started, a large number of migrant labourers mostly Banyankole were evicted and moved to Kibuli where Kakungulu’s sister offered them land for resettlement. The area they settled came to be known as Mululembo.”

In 1950, a murram road between the Industrial Area and Kibuli serving as a by-pass for traffic from Jinja Road to Entebbe Road was opened. The increased traffic plus the building of police barracks on the western borders of Kibuli led to fast expansion. Shops and service facilities like bars opened on both sides of the roads. Acholi quarters, which had started way back in 1920, rivalled Wabigalo as the two major drinking points in Kibuli.

According to Regina Solzbacher, towards independence, demand for land in the Industrial Area increased leading to extension towards Bugolobi.

Kibuli by reason of its location became the factory workers’ residential area that Mirams had mentioned. But rather than the construction of neat, permanent houses built by the municipality or the industry, the quarters were built by Kibuli house owners. Where cassava, matooke, and coffee shambas had formerly surrounded homes they were replaced with blocks of mud houses.

As these developments were going on, Kibuli also saw the influx of Luo from Kenya, joining the Basamia who had already settled in Namuwongo area in 1940. By 1952, they moved to Wabigalo where they opened malwa bars, and at the start of the 1960’s Wabigalo had become one of the most densely populated areas of Kampala.

In 1968, Kibuli became part of Kampala Municipality; almost 50 years later to date, low cost structures in the area are still visible. The expansion of early Kampala and existence of large swamps before 1930 separated the first Kibuli community from Mengo, this early isolation meant the place was not desirable for early expansion of Kampala, giving the settlers who were mainly migrants an introverted existence in the founding years.

The subsequent years when the Industrial Area was developed made Kibuli an ideal location for homes of low income earners who could hardly afford transport to work. Its location east of Buganda’s capital Mengo made it suitable for the non-Baganda settles in Buganda.
Regina also says, “Neglecting to give the Muslim community an urban-based grant as those given to Christian made Kibuli a likely location to serve both as a Muslim residential centre and education centre.”

About Nuhu Mbogo

There was opportunity for him to fight to become Kabaka of Buganda during the turbulent years of the late 19th Century especially after the death of Kabaka Muteesa I, his brother, but it became immediately evident that Nuhu Mbogo was more interested in the development of Islam than in leading Buganda.

Muteesa I had declared Islam a state religion in 1875 before the British colonialists went on the offensive to install Christianity as the supreme religion in Uganda.

In the 1900 Buganda Agreement, Mbogo was precluded from the list of eligible persons to become Kabaka, which was restricted to descendants of Muteesa I, but he was allocated miles of land at Kibuli, Kawempe and Nakawa, which he donated to the Muslim faith.

Mbogo was succeeded by Prince Badru Kakungulu, who in turn was succeeded by Prince Kassim Nakibinge. The title of “grandfather of Islam” has been passing down to each of the successors.

About the Nakivubo swamp

Writing in the Uganda Journal volume 34 of 1970, Regina .M. Solbacher, a social researcher at Makerere University, said “Kibuli was cut off from Kampala by the Nakivubo swamp and from Mengo by the Kayunga swamp. To go to Mengo from Kibuli one had to go all the way south of Nsambya.”
The former swamp is today called the Nakivubo Channel.

Number

1900
By 1900, a considerable number of migrants from Ankole, Tooro and Bunyoro had come to Buganda in search for work. Some of these migrants started filtering into Kibuli