How Gen Tumwine’s goodwill became Nommo Gallery’s undoing

What you need to know:

  • Genesis. The saga involving the Bush War veteran and the gallery is not entirely new; the last showdown was in 2013, when he published a lengthy letter detailing the history of the gallery, his role in it and why he does not owe any money to UNCC.
  • Like it happened before, the issue died out and Gen Tumwine stayed at the premise, writes Andrew Kaggwa.

Last week, the Speaker of Parliament, Ms Rebecca Kadaga, opened a can of worms when she ordered the Security Minister, Gen Elly Tumwine, to vacate the premises of Nommo Gallery, Uganda’s national gallery.
With the minister reiterating that he won’t vacate, he once again draws the gallery and its trustees – the Uganda National Cultural Centre (UNCC), formerly National Theatre – in the limelight after the past eventful two years.
That time, artists and other cultural stakeholders wanted to protect the land titles of UNCC properties after it was rumoured that there was a planned sale that would see the gallery and the piano shaped building that houses the UNCC, demolished for posh skyscrapers.
The saga involving the Bush War veteran and the gallery is not entirely new; the last showdown was in 2013, when he published a lengthy letter detailing the history of the gallery, his role in it and why he does not owe any money to UNCC.
Like it happened before, the issue died out and Gen Tumwine stayed at the premise.

Establishing Nommo Gallery
Established in 1963, different documents indicate that the gallery was initially located on Kampala Road. Uganda then had a vibrant art scene though many of the people practising were mobile.
According to Karundi Serumaga, a former director of UNCC, the 1960s era after independence was filled with a lot of energy as people were creating organisations - “the organisation to unite artists was mostly championed by a number of ladies, most of them expatriates,” he says.
However, the Kampala Road building would be demolished to pave way for city developments. This saw one of the ladies, a friend of Miria Obote, the then First Lady, talk to her and later a state lodge would be given to artists in 1967.
When Idi Amin took over power, the creative industry was almost under attack since the authority was suspicious of their work, especially playwrights and musicians.
“Some of them left because their lives were threatened, though others left because their livelihood had been disrupted and [they] couldn’t operate normally,” Serumaga says.
It was in 1988, two years after the National Resistance Movement (NRM) had taken power, that Gen Tumwine became a patron of the Uganda Artist Association (UAA), which had been formed earlier to unite artists.
But it was not the only thing that happened around the arts industry. Many people, who had no clue about how art organisations are run or managed, started scheming around as administrators, with many banking on the reputation Uganda had enjoyed around the art circles in the 1960s.

Genesis of the problem
The problems making headlines at the gallery today started after Gen Tumwine was appointed chairman of the Board of Trustees of the UNCC in 1992. In goodwill, the general fought and used his position to promote the gallery, invite artists back to the space, and setting up of an African food restaurant.
But as he did all the good, in his capacity, he put up an unsupervised structure that houses his office and Creations Ltd. Creation Ltd is a company associated with Gen Tumwine that started occupying part of the space at Nommo Gallery in the 1990s without a tenancy agreement entered between UNCC and the latter.
The lack of an agreement is what has created legal difficulties for UNCC to demand for what would be considered rental arrears for close to 20 years.
In 1997, Ms Janat Mukwaya, then minister on Gender, dissolved the UNCC board [after] it was realised that for the entire time they had been in office, they had never been audited, which created confusion.
“For instance, as chairman of the board, it was conflict of interest to give himself two shops in the craft village, set up a structure at Nommo Gallery and building a gift shop in the National Theatre foyer,” Serumaga notes.
But to make matters worse, the structure that housed a Creations Ltd gift shop in the foyer had never paid rent.
And much as Serumaga and his team successfully evicted Gen Tumwine from the National Theatre foyer, removing him from the Nommo Gallery property is something all administrations failed to do for more than 20 years.

How has Tumwine stayed this long?
Francis Ojede, the current UNCC executive director, says the General insists that he is occupying the space rightfully as an artist, the same way parliamentarians don’t ask for permission or pay rent to have offices within Parliament.
“UNCC works with institutes, not individuals,” he says.
Gen Tumwine’s ability to shapeshift at circumstances is what many claim has kept him at the gallery premises this long. For instance, Serumaga notes that when they tried to have him leave at the beginning of his tenure as a UNCC director, Gen Tumwine always challenged them that UNCC was not the rightful owner of the gallery.
“At the time, he was well aware UNCC didn’t have the land titles of Nommo Gallery and thus easily dismissed us,” Serumaga says.
Today, almost fourteen years after UNCC secured the Nommo Gallery land titles, Gen Tumwine is still staying put but mainly because of the various positions he has held in the art industry.
For example, he knows when to address the situation as an artist, association, as well as an authority; “When it comes to the worst, then he will address it as a General,” notes an artist who requests anonymity.
According to Ojede, they have been dealing with these issues since the General took office in 2013 and had taken a diplomatic approach of writing to him through the board.
A letter addressed to the Solicitor General from the board in 2013 even intimates that at one time, the General was willing to legalise Creation Ltd’s stay at Nommo Gallery.
However, even when an agreement had been designed, Creations Ltd never got back to UNCC, creating another stalemate that was partly resolved when a letter signed by Keith Muhakanizi, the Permanent Secretary and Secretary to the Treasury, giving UNCC a go ahead to collect all rent arrears, which must be served to Creations Ltd since there was no Memorandum of Understanding between the two parties at the time Tumwine started operating in the space.

What the artist association says
Much as Gen Tumwine says he’s occupying the space as a patron of UAA, views of artistes seem to differ.
For instance, this newspaper has learnt that the association for which the General is a patron, has since rebranded to Uganda Visual Artist and Designer’s Association (UVADA), whose office is surprisingly in the General’s backyard at the gallery.
“There was a lot of conflict surrounding the original association as musicians felt they had to be part of it. That was the reason we rebranded to highlight visual and design that had been left out in the naming of UAA,” says Edward Waddimba, the current president of UVADA.
It was also believed that UAA had ceased serving the interests of visual artists but only those of Gen Tumwine.
“But even if he was a patron, it is not like he is a director or chairman to have an office there,” Serumaga says.
Last week, in a letter to Parliament, Gen Tumwine noted that they were misinformed. He said the gallery doesn’t belong to the government but artists, adding that the only reason the land titles are under UNCC is because in 2004, there was a threat by government officials to grab the property.
“Nommo Gallery belongs to visual artists and a trustee is not an automatic owner,” he wrote.
“When Gen Tumwine persuaded Pearl Restaurant to open up at Nommo Gallery, he fought so much to see that they normalise their relationship with UNCC. If the gallery doesn’t belong to UNCC, why was he forcing other businesses on it to normalise their working with the same institution he now says doesn’t own them?” Serumaga questions.

The role of UNCC
While UNCC is the home of performing art, Nommo Gallery is meant to be the home of visual artists – both under the trusteeship of UNCC.
UNCC has a responsibility of promoting, popularising and preserving art and culture; providing and setting up cultural centres across the country.
If it operated as it was intended, Nommo Gallery was supposed to be a custodian of data bases of Ugandan artists and some of their monumental works. It was supposed to have the documentation of works that have shaped perceptions and culture, yet 59 years after UNCC’s establishment, they have failed to expand beyond their walls on Dewinton Road and Victoria Avenue.
For instance, Nommo Gallery barely makes any sales despite having some of the best art collections in the country. Today, the gallery can’t even pay its staff’s wages.
Some artists claim the location of the gallery near the State House, Nakasero, has highly hampered its performance.
“No one wants to experience art with soldiers monitoring their movements,” says Teddy Nabisenke, an artist.
Ojede says their plan is to see UNCC spread its wings to other regions to have a better impact, and says unlike before, the government is positive about funding the process.
Though Serumaga says plans to have UNCC expand beyond its Kampala presence to every Ugandan district had existed, he says “… then the madness of creating new districts started. We even tried writing to them to know when they were intending to stop.”
The plans then changed to turning community centres into alternative spaces for both performances and cultural communications, but it never materialised.
Community centres in Uganda were originally created by the colonial government and were the points they used to get their message down to the people at grassroots - each centre had a community hall and at times a playfield.
At one time, Uganda had over 700 community centres that are mostly non-existent today.