Letter to Uganda’s Silverbacks in Kigali: You’re from noble history

Uganda’s national basketball team the Silverbacks, are playing this evening against Senegal in the Rwanda capital Kigali in Afrobasket, the 59-year-old  men’s basketball continental championship of Africa.

 The International Basketball Federation’s (FIBA) Power Rankings of the 16 teams in the Kigali finals places Uganda ninth. Explaining the ranking, FIBA says; 

 “Uganda have faced ups and downs to make it to Kigali. After a historic away win against Morocco last month, the Silverbacks revealed they would risk missing out on the 16-nation AfroBasket due to lack of funds. Eventually, they made it…Uganda come up at No.9 in this ranking purely due to their bravery and determination to compete against the continent’s elite. And if the team’s most impactful player Ishmail Wainright [he is] is available, this team could go places.”

 This is Uganda’s third trip to the Afrobasket finals, and in that sense, it reminds us that it is part of the wider wind of change in the nation’s sports fortunes of the last seven years, from football to athletics (placing second in Africa in the recent Tokyo Olympics medals table and 36th overall).

 Basketball in Uganda doesn’t boast the long history, mass following and social entrenchment of football, or the devilish hunkish-sexiness of rugby, but has deep justice, compassion, and internationalist roots. On its website, the Federation of Uganda Basketball Associations (FUBA) has a history of the game in Uganda but, understandably, does not ask what they mean.  We learn that the first basketball court in Uganda was built in 1950 at Kisubi. However, the game took off in 1962 with the arrival of the American Peace Corps and the Teachers for East Africa (an organisation of American educators who supported secondary education in Kenya Uganda and Tanzania).  Thereafter, the formation of (ABAU) in 1963 a year after gave momentum to the game in Uganda - now renamed Federation of Uganda Basketball Associations.

 “The political instability and economic hardships in Uganda caused a general decline of the game in the country. The standards dropped quite rapidly during the latter part of ’70s and throughout the ’80s many schools abandoned the game as the coaches declined and the facilities dilapidated. 

 “Some clubs survived the turmoil and kept the game going even when the political climate was unfavourable. The Uganda Prisons, Ugandan Commercial Bank [now the late] and Makerere university basketball clubs played friendly games... One of the oldest tournaments that was first organised in 1969 is Makerere University open basketball tournament which brought together several teams from schools and some institutes.

 “St. Henry’s Kitovu and these kept the game undercover but still alive. Basketball in schools was especially spearheaded by the Brothers of Christian Instruction most notable of who was Father Leo who did a lot of work for basketball in Kimaanya primary school, St Joseph’s Primary School Nkoni, Kasasa SS, Bukalasa and Katigondo Seminaries, Mugwanya Preparatory School, Kabojja and St. Savio, Kisubi.

 “Early 1990s saw some deliberate efforts to resurrect the game by the springing up of clubs like Rhino, Blue Jackets, Kyambogo…a number of radical youths came up strongly to change the decaying face of basketball in Uganda. A new FUBA executive committee headed by Eng. Hillary Onek made a serious attempt at reviving the sport in the country. A schools programme was established which now boasts of schools from all over the region. A basketball league was then started in 1995 with six teams: Kyambogo, Blue Jackets, Black Power (now power), Rhino, Sky Jammers and Makerere University. The league has today experienced considerable growth and boasts of three divisions…and two divisions for women...”

 There are several trends hidden in all this. First, basketball in Uganda is, for lack of a better expression, a game that grew mainly from the Catholic periphery and moved to the centre. That has its roots in colonialism and the Protestant hegemony of the period.

 Historically, schools like Kisubi provided the country’s leading basketball stars. During Idi Amin’s time, basketball was a strange, impassioned contact sport (perhaps the only safe one),  and a proxy political duel between the Army and The Hill. In the last years of Amin, there was this chap Kiwanuka, I think a former Kisubi boy. Often the shortest guy on the court, when he was on form Makerere University was unbeatable. Kiwanuka could shoot three-pointers even blinded from any point of the Makerere Court. And there was Fred Tidoldi Asaba (older brother of former Attorney General William Byaruhanga).  He was a specialist of the steal, and impossible to guard.  But basketball was also a refuge for, especially Rwandan and (South) Sudanese refugees in Uganda. Towering above Ugandans, the many who joined the school systems supplied the sportsmen who took the game to new levels. The Silverbacks in Kigali should be proud that they are part of a greater story than they imagined.

Mr Onyango-Obbo is a journalist, writer and curator of the “Wall of Great Africans”. 

Twitter: @cobbo3