Govt reassures Kabaka on Buganda region map

KAMPALA. The Ministry of Health has downplayed Kabaka Mutebi’s fears over the omission of Buganda from the national map showing regional vaccination coverage in the country.
The ministry’s permanent secretary, Dr Diana Atwiine, said in a telephone interview that “land cannot be transferred from one place to another”.
“You cannot transfer districts or land from one place to another. Places remain wherever they have been before. Uganda remains Uganda, one nation,” Dr Atwiine said yesterday.

In his birthday speech in Masaka District on Friday, the Kabaka sounded dissatisfied with “maps that are excluding Buganda as a region.”
“All other parts of Uganda we know such as Busoga, Karamoja, Ankole, Bunyoro and others are existent (on the map of Uganda) but Buganda is not indicated. This is when I ask what the motive is? I have not yet known the motive,” Kabaka stated in a televised event.

But Dr Atwiine said: “I think we should focus on the core aim of service delivery. For me whatever we call Uganda does not matter. The most important thing is people getting services.”
The kingdom’s minister for information and cabinet affairs, Mr Noah Kiyimba, yesterday said the Katikkiro, Mr Charles Peter Mayiga, has already taken up the matter with government. “The Kattikiro pointed out the anomaly to government but they have not responded. We want them to rectify that intentional mistake in good faith,” Mr Kiyimba said.

Soon after Kabaka’s speech, social media commentators shared a Ministry of Health map that displays basic vaccination coverage by region.

The map shows all the traditional regions of Uganda as West Nile, Acholi, Karamoja, Bunyoro, Lango, Teso, Elgon, Bukedi, Busoga, Bunyoro, Tooro, Ankole but omits Buganda, and has in its place South Central and North Central.
This elicited anger, with some alleging that government wants to erase Buganda from the map of Uganda.

But Dr Atwiine said the omission is not core and that focus should be put on ensuring that Ugandans receive the basic health care. “We have hundreds of reports, really very many. But I can tell you maps change nothing whether it is Ankole or Bugisu- we should ensure service delivery.”