The Silence That Speaks: In Memory of Bobby Kabonero

RIP: Robert “Bobby” Kabonero. PHOTO/COURTESY
What you need to know:
I did not know Bobby personally, but I know his parents, Richard and Grace Kabonero; his uncle and godfather, Bob Kabonero; his aunt Susan Muhwezi; and the wider Kabonero and Rukaari families
There are sorrows that knock gently at the edges of our experience—and then there are those that descend like a storm: sudden, unrelenting, and utterly indifferent to our preparedness. The passing of Robert “Bobby” Kabonero, at just twenty-four years old, is one of those storms—devastating, disorienting, and impossible to make sense of. It is not merely the death of a young man; it is the violent unraveling of a future once imagined—the laughter that will no longer echo through familiar rooms, the milestones that will remain forever unmet, the presence that once quietly supported others now painfully absent.
I did not know Bobby personally, but I know his parents, Richard and Grace Kabonero; his uncle and godfather, Bob Kabonero; his aunt Susan Muhwezi; and the wider Kabonero and Rukaari families. And it is through them—through their grief, their grace, and their love—that I have come to feel the weight of what has been lost. As a father to children close to Bobby’s age, the very thought of such a loss feels like an implosion—something collapsing inward, silently and unbearably.
On the evening of May 12, I joined mourners at Bobby’s vigil. The atmosphere was heavy with sorrow yet enveloped in a sacred stillness—as though something deeper than grief was taking place, unfolding quietly among us. One by one, family and friends rose to speak. Their words, though fragile with emotion, wove together a portrait of a gentle, brilliant, and sensitive soul—someone who loved without spectacle, thought with depth, and was cherished beyond measure. Beneath every tribute lay the ache of the unfinished—a life paused mid-sentence, a silence that now speaks louder than any farewell.
The journey that brought us to this moment began on that fateful day in late January, when Bobby suffered a tragic, accidental, self-inflicted gunshot wound. He would spend the next 96 days in a hospital in Nairobi, suspended between hope and heartbreak—his life delicately balanced between two worlds. Through it all, his family remained by his side. Day and night, through every uncertain hour, his father, mother, sister Amanda and relatives kept vigil. Amanda’s presence was more than an act of familial devotion; it was an act of sacred love—a quiet, unwavering ministry of presence. In her, we glimpse the kind of hope that does not announce itself, does not clamour to be seen, but simply remains. In a time such as this, Amanda’s endurance speaks of a deeper kind of strength—the strength that stays.
And yet, as we mourn Bobby’s death, we must also confront what it reveals in the fabric of our society. His passing is more than a devastating heartbreak to one family; it is a mirror held up to a nation slowly forgetting how to see its own children. A quiet crisis is unfolding all around us, hidden in plain sight. Many of our young sons and daughters are navigating life beneath the surface—burdened, unseen, unheard. They walk among us smiling, posting, performing, while behind those carefully curated images and practiced replies lie silent struggles: fears they cannot name, expectations they cannot meet, wounds they do not yet know how to voice. They are asking questions in a language we’ve forgotten how to hear. And every day we delay our listening, another soul drifts further into silence.
They walk through our homes, our schools, and even our churches carrying the weight of invisible pain—smiling on the outside, unraveling within—while the world around them rushes on, too hurried to notice. Bobby’s death has awakened thoughts—and quiet fears—that I have been carrying for some time and occasionally voicing in conversations with other parents. We speak in hushed tones, behind closed doors, trying to name what we barely understand: that something is fracturing in the hearts of our children. That beneath the surface of their lives, something sacred is being strained—and we are only just beginning to notice, perhaps too late in some cases, that our silence has become part of the problem.
We have cultivated a world where performance is mistaken for worth, and silence for strength. We reward polish over honesty and penalise vulnerability with shame or indifference. Our homes grow louder with activity but quieter in intimacy; our churches are filled with programs but often slow to offer true presence; our institutions hum with busyness but rarely pause to see. And somewhere in the noise and the motion, the soul quietly slips away—unnoticed, unheld.
In our earnest striving to provide, to discipline, to direct, we sometimes forget to simply be—to pause long enough to notice the shifts in our children’s eyes, to listen without correcting, to see without projecting. We offer them protection but not always presence, answers but not always understanding. And in that absence, something precious begins to fracture.
We inherit the vocabulary of love, but not always its practice—offering instruction where empathy is needed, and correction where companionship might quietly heal. We teach our children how to strive, but not always how to suffer, how to succeed but not how to be seen. Bobby’s death is not just a tragedy—it is a reckoning. A plea. A call to return: to presence, to tenderness, to the sacred and urgent task of watching over the hearts of our children before they slip into a silence we can no longer reach.
These reflections are not necessarily particular to Bobby, but his passing has brought them to the surface—giving shape to the quiet fears and unanswered questions that have long lingered in the hearts of many parents, myself included. His death has forced us to look more closely, to speak more honestly, and to feel more deeply what we can no longer afford to ignore.
Even in mourning, Scripture gently invites us into a deeper reckoning. God rarely prepares us for transformation through ease alone; more often, it is through pain—through moments that undo us, that leave us questioning, aching, and searching for meaning. Before the Promised Land, there was the wilderness. Before the resurrection, there was the Cross. And before joy, there is often mourning. This is the quiet rhythm of consecration: that through loss, something sacred is being formed. That even in our deepest sorrow, God is near working in the hidden places, preparing our hearts for what we cannot yet see.
To be consecrated is to be set apart for God’s purpose. Sometimes it happens through voluntary surrender—like Paul, laying down his life for a greater calling. Sometimes it comes by divine command—like Abraham, asked to place what he loved most on the altar. And sometimes—perhaps most painfully—it is forged through suffering, like Job, who lost everything yet refused to let go of God. Consecration always carries a cost. But in the hands of a loving God, even our pain is not wasted. It can be made sacred—woven into a purpose we may not yet understand, but which Heaven does not overlook.
Perhaps Bobby’s passing—though we may never fully understand it—is a form of consecration. A piercing call to turn our hearts again: to awaken from distraction, to love with greater intention, to notice what we have too often overlooked. In his absence, we are invited to see more clearly—to behold the quiet, sacred lives around us before they fade into silence.
Bobby was one of those quiet springs—steady, life-giving, perhaps unnoticed until now. And in his absence, we are left with a haunting question: are we tending to the quiet springs among us? Are we truly listening to the soft, inner voices of our children—their doubts, their fears, their longings? Or have we become a society that only begins to pay attention once the silence becomes final, once the loss becomes too loud to ignore?
To Richard and Grace, to Bob and Susan, and to the entire Kabonero and Rukaari family—may the God of all comfort gather you into His eternal embrace, even in this valley of unbearable sorrow. May your tears, too many to count, be gathered by the One who never forgets a single drop. May your silence, heavy with unspoken grief, be heard in the courts of heaven where no anguish goes unnoticed. In moments like these, when words fail and consolation feels out of reach, may you be held by the truth that God sees the end from the beginning—that what is shattered in time is never lost to eternity. In His mercy, He is able to redeem even what feels irredeemable, to bring light through the cracks, and to carry you when the weight is too great to bear alone.
To the rest of us—parents, mentors, leaders, faith communities, neighbours: let Bobby’s death not be the end of the story. Let it be a consecration—a sacred turning point that disrupts our indifference and reawakens our responsibility. Let it stir us to create spaces where our children are not merely guided, but heard; not merely shaped, but known. Let us not wait for loss to teach us how to love. Let Amanda’s silent vigil remind us of what is most powerful—not eloquence, not answers, but presence. Healing often begins there—in the quiet, faithful act of staying. Staying close. Staying present. Staying awake to each other’s humanity before it fades into silence. Let us not be too late again.
Rest well, Bobby.
Though I saw you only at a distance, I heard your name spoken in whispers—spoken not just with sorrow, but with love.
I saw your light reflected in the tears of your family, your cousins, your friends—each one carrying a part of your story, your spirit.
I sat among those who cherished you, and in their mourning, I glimpsed the quiet depth of who you were.
And I will not forget.
May your life, and even your death, become a spring—hidden no longer, but rising up, flowing with healing for a generation longing for truth, for tenderness, for hope.
The author is a Ugandan father, entrepreneur, and writer who wrote this reflection to honour Bobby’s life and speak to the urgent needs of a generation.