The origins of her own clan, Madi Oruba
What you need to know:
Ujeo Mary Consolata Moro’s Unlocking Potential does exactly that. Beyond inspiring the people with whom Ujeo Mary Consolata Moro shares traditions, ancestry and aspirations, the book promises to be a sneak peek (for the outsider) into the Madi people, their origins, their current struggles and their future
Title: Unlocking Potential
Author: Mary Consolata Ujeo Moro
Price: Shs55,000
Availability: Aristoc Bookshop
Pages: 392
Published: 2025
When an autobiographical book starts with a scholarly dive into the origins of the writer's entire ethnic group, going back several centuries, the book is no longer a pet project about the struggles and successes of one person but a scholarly one. Ujeo Mary Consolata Moro’s Unlocking Potential does exactly that. Beyond inspiring the people with whom Ujeo Mary Consolata Moro shares traditions, ancestry and aspirations, the book promises to be a sneak peek (for the outsider) into the Madi people, their origins, their current struggles and their future. This is not one of those run-of-the-mill inspirational books like the title suggests, it is a history. It is an important cultural book. The writer painstakingly goes to lengths to create a context for her own being, centuries before her being. This, readers will find, is the most profound aspect of the book.
Before she was, there were the circumstances that led to the circumstances that brought her to life. The book starts out with the very large picture of the entire Madi ethnic group moving south from Juba and other areas up North, fleeing slavers and family feuds, following the Nile. Having built that background for a full eight chapters, the writer then zooms in to show one little girl, struggling like a tree sapling, craning it's neck through a dark undergrowth just catch some sun rays of its own and become a large tree in her own right. After illustriously painting the picture of the Madi ancestry and migration, the traditions and cultures, the writer then narrows it down to the origins of her own clan, Madi Oruba. All this build up is felt by the reader, making the book had to part with. She spends a considerably time building the characters of her grandfather and her grandmother, paints a painstaking picture of her father and mother and their unfortunate decision to have her while they were students at MUK.
It is an absolute beauty. All this lends such a weighty importance to the personal story that lies ahead, so much so that by the time the writer is born, you already love her. She is the undisputed star of the movie and you are utterly interested in her life story. I can’t remember a time I read an autobiographical book that was this engrossing. Anyone interested in Madi history and culture would find this book absolutely important. Anyone that wants to be inspired to live a life of purpose and success will find it helpful. The fact that Ujeo chose to start from such an elevated point of view puts her story in the right spot on the map, making it easy for the reader to create an identity of the writer, making her story more meaningful.
By the time you meet her in chapter nine, you are ready to go anywhere with her. By the end of the book, you have read a story about a great lady who beat odds, odds that started long before she was born, to be greater than her clan leader grandfather Matia Aturusi Kajoale because, while he fathered a clan, she went back in time to find out where the entire Madi ancestry came from and made sense of it for posterity and the world at large. I highly recommend the book to all West Nilers, all Madi people and anyone that loves a good, well-researched story. This book is a testament to the fact that deep research makes a great book. You leave not just inspired but educated as well.
