Chief hits 100 years, raps land grabbers

Entebbe

A former chief in Buganda Kingdom, who celebrated his 100th birthday at the weekend, used the ceremony to lash out at land grabbers.

During the thanksgiving ceremony at his home in Nkumba, Mr Nelson Edmund Sebugwawo, the grandfather of the Nabagereka of Buganda, Ms Sylvia Nagginda, handed out a 50-page autobiography with strong views on Buganda’s federo and land issues.

“I am very disappointed with what is going on today with our land. Why should our land be given to foreigners without our consent?” the book, titled My Life reads in part.

However, he adds: “It would be okay to sell land or give it away to a person who is going to develop it no matter where they come from because the land will not move and the people come from Lango or Acholi cannot move away with our land. It will always be in Buganda.”

The chief is thankful to God for fulfilling all his dreams. The book recounts the old man’s entry into Buganda civil service and how he rose to become the treasurer of the kingdom, before his involvement in independence politics of negotiating the first presidency of Uganda. The book also devotes several paragraphs to the lost counties question, for which he was a chief campaigner and strategist for Buganda.

On a federal system for the country, Mzee Sebugwawo writes: “All the members of the delegation from Uganda agreed on the federal system. It was agreed that Buganda would have a full federal system while the other parts of Uganda were to have it later because they didn’t have enough resources to sustain it…therefore, I think that it is a shame that to this date we have not achieved federalism in Buganda and Uganda as a whole.”

The event was attended by Kabaka Ronald Mutebi, former premier, Apollo Nsibambi, Katikkiro John Baptist Walusimbi, among others.

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