General Information on UgandaUganda is a land-locked country in East Africa located between the countries of Sudan, Congo, Rwanda, Tanzania, and Kenya. It is a country of vast differences, both physically and culturally. Its physical features vary from the snow capped peaks of the Ruwenzori Mountains on the western border, to jungle and rain forest in the South to very dry semi-arid country in the North. Generally, the land is very fertile producing many different plants and crops. On its southeastern border, Uganda also has Lake Victoria, one of the largest fresh water lakes in the world from which the mighty Nile River has its beginning. Area236,040 sq km – about the size of the state of Minnesota. ClimateUganda has an equatorial climate, moderated by altitude. Vegetation is heaviest in the south; it thins to savanna with dry plains in the northeast.Rainfall Rainfall varies from more than 2,500mm/100in around Lake Victoria to about 500mm/20in in the northeast. There are typically two dry seasons; December to February and June to August. TemperaturesUganda is sunny most of the year with temperatures averaging 29C/84F. The temps around the capital city range from 6C/60F to 38C/100F depending on the season.Population Total – 28,816,000 Population Under age 18 – 57.3% Life expectancy (2005) – 49Fertility rate (2005) – 7.1LanguagesEnglish (official national language, taught in grade schools, used in courts of law and by most newspapers and some radio broadcasts), Ganda or Luganda (most widely used of the Niger-Congo languages, preferred for native language publications in the capital and may be taught in school) CurrencyUgandan shilling (UGX) Gross National Income per capita (US$)(2005) - $280Average daily income – less than $1Adult Literacy68.9% (WHO)Sources taken from these internet sites: UNICEF, Library of Congress Country studies, World Health Organization, and the CIA World Fact Book
Religion in UgandaSixty-six percent of Ugandans are Christian, equally divided between Roman Catholics and Protestants; the largest Protestant denomination is the Anglican Church of Uganda. Fifteen percent of Ugandans are Muslim; the remainder follow traditional tribal religions, Hinduism, or practice no religion. (Library of Congress Country studies)
Uganda's HistoryUganda traces its beginnings to the Bunyoro and Buganda kingdoms of the 16th and 17th centuries, as well as to immigrants from Sudan and Kenya. The 19th century brought the first European explorers and Christian missionaries. In 1894, Uganda was established as a British protectorate with the King of the Buganda tribe retaining his position under their rule. In 1958, Uganda was granted internal self-government, and on October 9th, 1962, they received their independence from Britain. The colonial boundaries created by Britain to delimit Uganda grouped together a wide range of ethnic groups with different political systems and cultures. These differences prevented the establishment of a working political community after independence was achieved in 1962. It took over 20 years to get to the stability that was hoped for at their independence. In 1962, Milton Obote became the Prime Minister with King Mutesa presiding as the King of Buganda. In 1966, Obote overthrew King Mutesa and ruled by martial law for five years before a military coup forced him into exile. Idi Amin took power in 1971, suspended the constitution, and ruled the country with the military for the coming decade. Idi Amin's rule cost an estimated 300,000 Ugandans' lives. He forcibly removed the entrepreneurial Indian minority from Uganda, decimating the economy. His reign was ended after the Uganda-Tanzania War in 1979. This led to the return of Obote from 1980-85. Guerrilla war and human rights abuses under Obote claimed at least another 100,000 lives when government troops carried out genocidal sweeps of the rural populace in a region that became known as the Luwero Triangle. In 1986, Yoweri Museveni and his National Resistance Army took the capital city of Kampala by military force and have ruled since then. Museveni’s rule since 1986 has brought three presidential elections, relative stability and economic growth to Uganda.
Government and Political Conditions in UgandaGovernmentThe 1995 constitution established Uganda as a republic with an executive, legislative, and judicial branch. The constitution provides for an executive president to be elected every 5 years. President Yoweri Museveni, in power since 1986, was elected in 1996 and reelected in 2001 and 2006. Legislative responsibility is vested in the parliament; legislative elections were last held February 2006. There are currently 99 women representatives in the 332-member parliament. The Ugandan judiciary operates as an independent branch of government and consists of magistrate's courts, high courts, courts of appeals, and the Supreme Court. Parliament and the judiciary have significant amounts of independence and wield significant power.Political ConditionsSince assuming power, Museveni and his government have largely put an end to the human rights abuses of earlier governments, initiated substantial economic liberalization and general press freedom, and instituted economic reforms.The vicious and cult-like Lord's Resistance Army (LRA), which seeks to overthrow the Ugandan Government, has murdered and kidnapped civilians in the north and east since 1986. Although the LRA does not threaten the stability of the government, LRA violence at one time displaced up to 1.7 million people, creating a humanitarian catastrophe, particularly when they were forced into internally displaced persons (IDP) camps for their own protection. The Uganda Peoples Defense Force (UPDF) launched "Operation Iron Fist" against LRA rebels in northern Uganda in 2002 and conducted operations against LRA sanctuaries in southern Sudan with the permission of the Sudanese Government. The Sudanese Government had previously supported the LRA. There have been significant new developments in this conflict since January 2006. Peace talks are ongoing and are the current focus to bring an end to this conflict.
AIDS and Orphans in UgandaAIDSHIV/AIDS Prevalance:4.1% (2003 est.) (WHO)Uganda has seen one of the most effective national responses to the HIV/AIDS pandemic on the African continent. Following the end to the civil war in 1986, the new government created and implemented comprehensive policies that dramatically slowed the rate of new infections. In recent years, an abstinence-only strategy has drawn criticism from critics; however the statistics are showing that this approach is working. The high level of government commitment and the openness with which the problem has been tackled has assisted Uganda in the reduction of prevalence of the disease in the country. Prevalence has gone down from 30% in 1990 to 9% in 1999 to 4% in 2003. The current thrust of the interventions now is to maintain the downward trend in prevalence of the disease.OrphansAfrica has an orphan epidemic. Nearly 2 million children are orphaned in Uganda alone. (UNICEF) Part of the cause of this epidemic stems from the history of war that the country has. During the regimes of Idi Amin and Milton Obote there were hundreds of thousands of people massacred which left millions of orphaned children. However, half of the children that are orphaned have been orphaned from the AIDS virus. It is estimated that by 2010 there will be as many as 3.5 million children orphaned.
Ugandan CultureIt is difficult to exhaustively describe an entire culture and people group in a couple of paragraphs so please don't look for that here. Instead what I will try to do is tell about some of the common and interesting culture related questions that I am asked.What do they eat?Central and Southern Uganda are very fertile and can produce a wide variety and plentiful crops. Fruits such as pineapple, mango, papaya, guava, avocodo, passion fruit, watermellon, many varietys of bananas, and many other fruits are commonly grown. There are a number of vegitables that are also very common such as, cabbage, carrots, potatoes, sweet potatoes, kidney beans, corn, egg plant, and tomatoes. The staple foods for many Ugandan diets include, posho and beans, matoke, rice, ground nut sauce, sweet potatoes, potatoes, meat sauce, and chapatis. Posho is corn that is ground to flour and mixed with water for porrige in the morning, similar to cream of wheat, and in the evening they add less water to make it thick enough to slice and then they put beans on top of it. Matoke is a type of banana that is pealed steamed and mashed, similar to mashed potatoes. Ground nut sauce is a gravy like sauce made out of peanuts that is poured over posho or rice or matoke or potatoes. Chapatis are a fried flat bread, similar to what we know as tortillas. The food in Uganda is good especially the fruit although they don't use a lot of spices so much of the food is rather bland. What are the children like?Young children in Uganda are generally very soft spoken especially when talking to adults. They are very fun loving and will smile very big once you break the ice. They are generally respectful towards teachers and adults. How do they handle death?Death is a common part of life in Uganda. In fact is is so common that most of the English to Luganda tourist translation guides have complete sections on sickness and death. Because they don't have funearal homes or embalming services they usually bury someone who has died on the same day or next day after they die. They commonly bury their dead in their home tribal area or family burial plot and so many times they have to travel quite a distance for the burial if the person wasn't in their home area. Even though death is common it still effects people and hurts to lose someone that they love. How do you buy things?There is very rarely a fixed price in Uganda. Almost every price is negotiable and most of the trade particularily in the markets is done by bartering. How do people live?Living conditions are very different between the rural areas and the city. In the rural areas the poorest people may be lucky enough to live in a mud hut and hand dig their own gardens hopefully producing enough to live on. There is somewhat of an emerging middle class that can roughly be described as people who have a job and live in hand made brick houses. Very few own vehicles. The upper class live in Kampala the capital city in very nice homes. They will likely own a vehicle. The gap between the rich and the middle class is wide. (Syd Sparks)
