Borup didn’t bring cotton to Uganda, he found it here

In 1904, Kristen Eskildsen Borup introduced cotton in Uganda. This is recorded in primary school books and also taught to pupils in Uganda. But was there no cotton in Uganda before 1904?

It is not true that Borup, the Church Missionary Society (CMS) agent who in 1905 joined the famous Uganda Company introduced cotton in Uganda.

What is correct is that in 1904, the Whites simply introduced a better type of cotton they wanted grown in Uganda. It was Streicher, a French Catholic priest who introduced cotton farming in Uganda in 1897 after he was made the Bishop of Rubaga.

By 1901, the earliest consignment to be shipped to Europe was ready; but due to lack of transport means, it could not be carried on the head to Kisumu; and the cotton industry collapsed for the first time in Uganda. This is also scantily revealed in the Report on the introduction of and establishment of the cotton industry in Uganda protectorate published in 1909 by Governor Hesketh Bell.

Cotton existence in Uganda long before the Europeans arrived was documented by Sir Harry Johnston, the first British Commissioner to Uganda. He arrived in Uganda in December 1899 and left in 1902. In his book: ‘The Uganda Protectorate Volume 1, published in 1902, on page 291, Johnston wrote: ‘Cotton grows wild in Uganda, but like tobacco, might possibly not be worth exportation’.

And he adds: “The following summary of the animals, vegetables and mineral products (elephant ivory, hippopotamus teeth, lion, leopard and other wild cats skins, coffee, sugar, cotton, oil seeds, gold, iron, salt, plumbago and timber [etc.] are known to exist in the Uganda Protectorate and are likely to be of value in its commercial [Uganda’s]development”.

In other books such as In Darkest Africa and Through the dark continent published in 1875 and 1878, British explorer Henry Morton Stanley and The discovery of the source of the Nile published 1863 by another British explorer John Speke also reveal about the existence of cotton in Uganda which they termed as indigenous breeds growing wild.

One of the founding directors of the Uganda Company, Sir Thomas Victor Buxton in his memoirs of June 1904 when he was in Uganda also wrote about the existence of cotton in Uganda.

In his assessment of the crop, he wrote: “Cotton is found growing wild in Uganda and a sample recently submitted to a Manchester expert was pronounced by him to have a distinct commercial value.

It is intended to make experimental plantings of several of the best varieties of cotton and should these plantings be successful, steps would be taken to promote the growth of the article on a large scale for export”. Who took the sample to Britain and when; is another question to answer.

Who imported the exotic cotton into Uganda?
So was cotton imported to Uganda by the Uganda Protectorate government or the Uganda Company? And whose idea was it to import cotton into Uganda?

The Handbook of Uganda authored in 1903 by Thomas and Scott mentions the introduction of exotic cotton seeds into Uganda from the Khedivial Agricultural Society of Egypt; although the exact date is not stated.

Nonetheless, the authors wrote: “The government imported half a ton of seeds [cotton] of each of the Abassi, Affifi and Ashmouni types”.

In March 1904, Borup started distributing the two and a half tons of cotton seeds earlier imported from the British Cotton Growing Association (BCGA) which was founded in 1902 to promote cotton growing in the British Empire. The seeds were distributed to 29 chiefs in Buganda Kingdom.

In his letter dated February 22, 1904, to the CMS in England, Borup wrote: “These cotton seeds were not imported by the CMS, but by the Uganda Company Limited and the amount in question was paid by the company’. From the above, it would seem that the Uganda Protectorate imported exotic seeds in the country the Uganda Company did.

Whose idea was it to import cotton to Uganda?
In early 1903, when Borup, the Danish Canadian missionary thought of the introduction of commercial cotton farming in Uganda, he sold the idea to some of the leading chiefs and officials in Uganda as well as the CMS in England.

His friends wrote. This is also documented in the Uganda company files. But, was it his idea or it was a case of plagiarism and fleecing Muganziwongererwa, a Ugandan investor?

When Uganda was about to attain independence, KY member, MP Daudi Ochieng wrote in the Uganda Argus that cotton was first imported into the country by an Indian businessman Nanji Kalidas Mehta. His utterances attracted a stinging response from a Ugandan family which claimed their father was the pioneer of commercial cotton farming in the country in 1904.

The children of the late Samuel Mukasa Muganziwongererwa (His picture among other historical pictures were in 2011 stolen from this writer), led by one of his sons Paul Mukasa raised the matter claiming their late father was the first Ugandan to make a call for cotton farming in Uganda.

Because the issue was so contentious, the baffled Ugandan print media did not write about the history of cotton in their supplementary pages in the October 9, 1962 editions.

Unfortunately, the Muganziwongererwa family took the matter to the chairman of the Lint Marketing Board for arbitration instead of going to the courts of law.

Nonetheless, Ochieng’s evidence was only verbal, while Paul Mukasa presented documents supporting his claim. Among the evidence presented, were documents from G.F. Archer as the Governor of Uganda who in 1923 had promised Mugaziwongererwa 24 tractors and a two cent commission on every lb.
of cotton sold in appreciation of his contribution to the country’s economy – although the period for which it was to last was not mentioned.
In 1924, Governor Archer left before fulfilling his pledge. He had been in Uganda since 1922.

Developments
The Muganziwongererwa family revealed the story to the Uganda Argus of March 7, 1963.

Paul claimed that due to hard austerity conditions in Uganda then, his father, a Saza Chief of Bulemezi approached Borup of the Uganda Company on February 4, 1904, and asked him if there were any cash crops in other countries which be introduced into the country to improve on the people’s incomes.

Borup told him that cotton could be introduced but on condition that security had to be guaranteed in case the people refused to cultivate it.
The Chief had been compelled to approach Borup because of the worsening economic situation in Buganda after the introduction of the infamous poll tax of 3 rupees by the colonial government.

‘At the time, most people could not afford to pay the tax because there was no paying jobs or any other means of income. Anybody who could not afford the 3 rupees had either to collect three sacks of sisal or three bags of dried cassava and present it to the Muluka headquarters.

Whoever failed to comply was liable to forced labour which included carrying heavy loads for distances or pushing rickshaws to the government stations and, either to or, from the borders. Many of those who did forced labour died before their sentences expired’.

The chief’s son said. ‘The death coupled by the stories of cruel suffering and brutality encountered during the trips to and from the borders so frightened the public that many of those who realised that they could afford to pay the tax either committed suicide, or fled the country.

It was estimated that between 1900 when the tax was introduced and 1903, about 400 men in Buganda alone had hanged themselves’. Paul Mukasa said his father narrated to him when he was still alive.

Information about slavery at the said time is recorded by some colonialists though condensed. For instance Mukasa’s narrations corresponds Borup letter to Ms Flint of September 14, 1900 which in part reads: “There is great activity among the Baganda [Ugandans] at the present time.

The tribute will be collected before very long and each man has to find three rupees; for a labourer this means a little more than a month’s work. I have not before seen the Baganda so anxious to work or to earn money by any means as they are now”.

Similar information about forced labour in Ugandan is documented by historian, Prof Samuel Karugire in his book: Nuwa Mbaguta: the establishment of the British rule in Ankole.

However, unlike in Buganda, the Banyankole killed the British (including the infamous Gorte in 1905 in Ibanda) and their mercenaries who attempted to come to Buganda to grow cotton.

There was also a special tax imposed on the Bahima who adamantly refused to abandon their cattle to come to Buganda to grow cotton. As a result, many fled with their cattle to present Tanzania and DR. Congo. Some of the suspected killers and others culprits were captured and imprisoned in exiled in Kismayu in Somali.

Another CMS missionary C.W. Hattersley in his memoirs in early 1904 wrote: “Peasants and under chiefs had no settled income whatever, and there was no paid labour anyway previous to 1895; all was done by order of the chief, who received a present for making his serfs or slaves work when any building or porterage work was wanted by any European in the country.

This was quite legal, for the serfs worked only in their turn as an acknowledgement of the plot of land on which they worked and grew their food”.

Compulsory growth
Mukasa also told Uganda Argus that his father as the Saza Chief of Bulemezi on February 22, 1904 in an agreement pledge 20 square miles and 1,200 rupees for the importation of 375 lbs. of cotton from Egypt and the agreement was signed between Samuel Mukasa and Borup on behalf of the Uganda Company.

The agreement provided that the pledged land and the money would be forfeited if the people refused to grow the crop. All who grew cotton had to observe the Company’s instructions and all the cotton produced had to be sold exclusively to the company.

If the company’s requirements were defied, the chief was to be liable to a fine of 500 rupees. The agreement also stipulated that Uganda Company had to fix the price; and in case of a dispute over the price, or other matters related to the cotton industry, a panel of three judges had to be instituted – one by the Company, another by the Saza Chief and the third by the old Buganda Lukiiko.

Beneficiaries
When the seeds arrived, Samuel Mukasa distributed them to among some of his subjects in Bulemezi County and gave some to Saza Chiefs of Ssingo, Kyagwe and Kyadondo.

Fearing that many people might not grow cotton, Samuel Mukasa proposed to the District commissioner and the Governor to make cotton cultivation compulsory.

His suggestion was accepted and an order was made immediately circulated in Buganda. The Mukasa family had planned to commemorate the 65th anniversary in April 1969 to celebrate cotton industry in Uganda but the political tempo in Buganda was too hot for the function to be held.

Could Borup and the Governor have fleeced Muganziwongererwa of his fortune as Uganda’s first revolutionary investor?

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