The Weganda Review

Norbert Mao is a frantic democrat at fifty-six, a political freak. But is he betting on something?

by Odoki Jimmy Acellam

Mao’s Dialectic

A view of the road to Agoro Hills in northern Uganda's Lamwo District (C) Thomas Agaba Onyango

A road trip to a hill range in northern Uganda provokes meditation on yesterday’s ugliness as well as today’s beauty.

by Charles Onyango-Obbo

Similar Fruit

Uganda was producing intellectual journals by 1962. How could there be nothing to speak of in 2023?

by Founder of TWR

The Weganda Imperative

Just as kids of a certain generation were urged to delay their first sex act, can today’s children delay their first taste of junk food?

by Rodney Muhumuza

The First Takeaway

Corruption has become so rampant in Uganda today that we ought to find another word for what is happening.

by Marlon Agaba

Self-Entitlement

As some of us grow older, it’s to the friendships made as primary schoolers that we must return, seeking the warmth others can’t give

by Barbara Barungi

Full Circle

To be easily accessible to the other it helps, first and foremost, to be easily accessible to oneself

by Rachael Mwine

Digging Deep

The Weganda Review’s second issue (Oct. – Dec. 2023) has been published. Featured essays include writings on Norbert Mao, memory, childhood obesity, personal venality, retirement, and marital introspection. Art portfolios belong to Sanaa Gateja and Letaru Dralega. We have a short story by Jackee Budesta Batanda, poetry by Bridget Ankunda and Destiny Gladys Chaiga, and the private diary of a ‘juice bartender’ who lives and works near Kampala. Our Quote of the Quarter is extracted from The Leopard by Giuseppe Tomasi di Lampedusa. This is not a themed issue, but time is the general drift.

The Weganda Review’s inaugural issue (July-Sept. 2023) has been published. It features essays ranging from one dissecting the fear of witchcraft to one exploring the existential hopes and fears of the children of Uganda’s revolutionary leaders. There’s an interpretation of the spiritual lives of poachers, a tribute to Aggrey Awori, and a paean to small bars. Art portfolios belong to Sheila Nakitende and Farouq Ssebaggala. We have a short story by Asinde Regina, poetry by DevisThePoet and Keturah Sheebah Naluyange, and the private diary of a ‘gateman’ just outside Kampala. Our Quote of the Quarter is extracted from Humboldt’s Gift by Saul Bellow. This is not a themed issue, but existence is the general drift.

Diary of the Review

Lillian Awori, 'juice bartender' outside Kampala

Art of the Review

Talismans by Sanaa Gateja

Meditations by Letaru Dralega

Poetry of the Review

Two poems by Bridget Ankunda

Two poems by Destiny Gladys Chaiga

Weganda Precis: From the Archives

Awori’s Choice

by Emmanuel Martin Mutaizibwa

“A decade before he died, [Aggrey] Awori looked into the crystal ball and predicted that he was in the evening of his life in the material sense of things. So he commenced the construction of his final resting place, a tomb dug in an extension of his house in the hamlet of Kibimba, where one still can imagine him sitting in an easy chair and staring at treacherous rows of rice fields. Not many people literally dig their own graves, and one wonders why Awori didn’t reveal this strange decision to some close relatives. Was this a final act of patriotism by a man concerned that his dead body might be shipped across the border for burial? Perhaps it was, not for the first time, an expression of Awori’s choice. He lived in Uganda, would die in Uganda, and wanted to be buried in Uganda. At Kibimba he rests now, in the white-washed tomb he built for himself.”

A Charmed Life

by Rodney Muhumuza

“No doubt my mother, who always went around with a Bible in her bag, saw the incisions on my chest as repugnant to her Christian faith. But it’s fair to say that [my parents] in their last days were thinking of the welfare of their sons, believing obviously in all that’s good and durable. Thus I don’t present double-dealing syncretism in the confluence of my parents’ spiritual aspirations but a more holistic Afropastoral, a search for those cosmic particles that together can anchor a life not necessarily dependent on the nature of others. This Afropastoralism is not a pean to speculation but a reaffirmation of the inevitability of the parallel but equal spiritual forces that command me to focus when it really matters.”

Sons of the Resistance

by Risdel Kasasira

“[President Yoweri] Museveni’s unforgettable college manifesto is important for two reasons when it comes to Kainerugaba. One, that his father was and remains sui generis, one of a kind. Secondly, that [his son Muhoozi] Kainerugaba is putting himself under so much pressure by coveting his father’s seat. Despite their genetic kinship, they are not similar. Where Kainerugaba is quiet and brooding, Museveni can be charming and folksy. Where Museveni is calculative, Kainerugaba can be rash. And while Museveni has had so much luck going on for him, Kainerugaba may have to create his own luck.”

Among the Poachers

by Ivan Mugyenzi Ashaba

“My sense is that hunting, even when it becomes poaching, is not how the Banyaruguru misbehave. In fact it is how they have long behaved, a tradition they could not renounce any more than a little boy could be asked to give up his mother. Rather than seeing communities such as the Banyaruguru as problematic poaching hotspots and consequently breeding resentment over the perception that animals are treated better, understanding the ways of life of these communities can offer a window into alternative conservation approaches that don’t mimic those inherited from the colonial era.”

Office of the Aunt

by Jan Ajwang

“Questions kept sprouting up in my mind as I remembered what my classmate’s mother had said about the Banyole. That we curse people. At first I thought it odd that any tribe can be thought of like that. But such comments about the Banyole never stopped coming. Even today I still have people asking me so much about the Banyole, about their uncanny ability to impose curses. ‘Are you from that place where people just talk and things happen?’ ‘Oh, I fear those people. Banyole can curse!’ ‘You Banyole can even curse someone’s garden. Rain will not fall on his garden, yet it will be raining in the whole area.’ So, for me, I carry the fact of my being a Munyole like an albatross on my neck. But I also know that this stereotype, like all stereotypes, didn’t come from nowhere. As a Munyole woman I know that I have to be at my best behavior when interacting with people in my community who wield authority – and aunties rank supreme. Auntie X, Auntie Y, Auntie Z. And now, as I am one to a few nieces and nephews, Auntie Jan.”