Video: Jjemba the charming burial conductor

In the remote Mbulakati Village, Kitimbwa Sub-county, in Kayunga District, very few people know the 69-year-old Godfrey Jjemba by his real names. His neighbours call him munnamawulire (loosely translated as journalist).
Jjemba has been trending on social media, with the Omugenzi memes.

It is Jjemba’s skill and zeal of reading announcements and the long list of obituaries during funerals that earned him the ‘journalist’ title, in spite of him being a Senior Four dropout.

“I used to attend almost all burial ceremonies in my area as a mourner. People would read announcements and sometimes I felt I could do it better than them. When I started reading, I realised all mourners were enjoying how I was doing it. During the time I was reading the announcements, men laughed their heads off and after the exercise, some would approached me and thanked me for the work well done. I began reading announcements at funerals in 2018, and it took me three funerals before I became famous in the entire sub-county. Now, whenever someone dies, and I go to bury, I am called upon,” he says.

Jjemba says although he does not officially ask for a fee to read announcements, people know that when someone talks for a long time, he or she needs some “water.”

“You cannot request for a specific amount of ‘water’. You can pay me according to how I have performed or according to the financial situation in the home of the bereaved. But, whatever amount of ‘water’ one gives me, I take it. I also give mabugo at all the funerals I attend,” he says.

Jjemba uses a bicycle to travel throughout the sub-county attending different funerals, although he says the long distances are difficult. He does not have a mobile phone,  so those who need him have to make an announcement on the community radio station.

“Sometimes, people who need me approach the area councillor and he looks for me. But mostly, they find me through my wife’s phone. The only problem now is that she is away from home, looking after a patient at Kayunga Hospital,” he says.

Jjemba, who has never used the Internet, wonders why he is trending. 

“I am surprised about why I am trending and I am scared because, what if the government picks an interest in me? What if a drone (security operatives) comes here (at his home) and picks me up? Very many people are coming here to see me nowadays. People are drawing cartoons of me, which make me look like a doll or chimpanzee. What is the purpose of that?”

Jjemba is a subsistence farmer with 11 children and apart from the fame he receives in his sub-county, there is nothing tangible he gets from announcements.  For the last 15 years, he has been a revenue collector at four flea markets – Nkokonjeru, Kayonza, Kitimbwa, and Kyerima.

Jjemba says he became famous when he read announcements at a burial that the National Unity Platform president, Mr Robert Kyagulanyi Ssentamu, aka Bobi Wine, attended.  It was the funeral of Frederick Kateregga.

“In the papers I was given, they had written that the deceased had died because he had over bleached. I never knew that someone can die from bleaching. I decided to ignore that and told the people that he had died from malaria. You can imagine my surprise, when my picture began trending and someone had put a skirt on me!”

He adds that this is his calling from God. “Sometimes, they call me from the garden while on Tuesdays they find me in the market collecting dues,” he says.

The chairman of Mbulakati Village, Mr John Kyambadde, described Jjemba as a man with rare skills in reading burial announcements.

“Mourners are always attentive when he is reading the announcements and they love him so much,” he says.
Jjemba has been married to Joyce Nakabazzi for three years.  He says his first wife with whom he has 11 children got married to his neighbour in 2018. Jjemba says he has left his wife to be with the man although he sees her everyday.