Hi Caleb,
Thank you for sharing with us what transpired at the MASU function. It is
exciting to hear that you have kept close touch with our students'
organisations at Makerere. The students definitely need that kind of
role-modelling from MASU ancestors like you who made significant controbutions
to make the organisation what it is today. I also appreciate the challenge Dr
Ezati Alidria, the Patron of MASU gave the students to see our senior citizens
like Mr Etima, Dr Adriko, Tom Buruku, Mr Obitre gama, Mr Nyakuni etc as source
of inspiration. They have indeed inspired many of us in life.
Am also happy to learn that the students are becoming focussed and addressing
issues of concern to the wider community. Otherwise, the students had run MASU
down to a point where people had began losing interest in them because of their
unbecoming behaviour in parties. They had made MASU functions to become a stage
for blood letting and epitom of hooliganism and foolishness which no one would
like to associate with. For a number of years MASU functions contintinued to be
characterized by severe fighting, destruction of property and students being
arrested and taken to police for crime etc. It is encouraging that some
positive changes are being reported of MASU students.
However on your proposal to change the name of MASU to Mugbara Students Union
or Lugbara Makerere Students' Association i beg to differ for three or so
reasons. First of all in my view Arua is a cosmopoplitant district and not
entirely a Lugbara community. The Majority of the population in Arua may be
Lugbara but a significan proportion of the population in Arua has historically
comprised other communities like Alur, Kakwa, Nubians/Aringa, Madi etc. Thus
naming of the Association after Lugbara ... may not be appropriate as some
sections of the population from Arua might feel alienated. Secondly i feel we
should not change the name of MASU into something else because of historical
and cultural reasons. Historically MASU was the first cultural students'
organisation known to have existed in the history of Makerere if what the
founders told us by word of mouth is any thing to go by. Changing the name may
delink the organisation from its
historical identity from which it should continue to draw inspiration
and strength. Thirdly am of the opinion that changing the name of MASU because
other people's organisations have tribal or ethnic names such as TESDA, AMSA
may be counter productive as no two communities share exactly the same
sociocultural identities. Our situation are not exactly the same as the
situations in those communities.
I would like to humbly propose that the name of MASU remains as it is but MASU
should make a SWOT (Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats) analysis
of itself and realign its activities to take care of all the usbcommunities in
Arua. This will necessitate a strong, vibrant, dynamic and committed leadership
which MASU has not exhibited for a while. The students should stop electing
leaders on the basis of ones capacity for offering Malua at Kikonyi or
Makerere Kivuli. Forgive me those who love malua, i just wanted to make a
point. I hope Mr will accept my apology.
Thank you and let the conversation continue for it is through such open and
frank discussuions that we might stumple on some thing useful.
Sam Andema
University of British Columbia
Box 34
6335 Thunderbird Crescent
Vancouver, BC V6T 2G9
Canada
--- On Mon, 6/4/09, Caleb Alaka calebal...@yahoo.com wrote:
From: Caleb Alaka calebal...@yahoo.com
Subject: [WestNileNet] MASU Finalist and Hand Over Party.
To: A Virtual Network for friends of West Nile westnilenet@kym.net
Date: Monday, 6 April, 2009, 12:26 AM
Hi,
Over the weekend, I and Eng. Okuni represented the rest of you at this years
Makerere Arua Students Union Finalist and Hand Over party. The Chief Guest was
non other than Uncle Tom Buruku. Before he took to the podium, Dr. Isaac Ezaati
the Patron MASU unveiled uncle Tom in a manner that could make the Queen of
England bow to the occasion. He told us to look at Tom Buruku, Obitre Gama,
Joseph Etima, Dr. Eric Adriko, James Nyakuni as People who should inspire us
and act as our role models.The Students seem to have gained actual focus. They
addressed the issue of poor academic performance in West Nile, Land use and
other factors. When I was given an opportunity to address them, I opined about
the need to transform MASU to something similar to LUSU (Lugbara Students
Union), LUMSA (Lubgara Makerere Students Association) or LUSDA (Lubgara
Students Development Association. Why all this. MASU used to cover Arua
which included Kobobo, Yumbe, Maracha, Terego,
Ayivu, Madi Okollo, and Vura. Now we have Koboko District, Yumbe District,
Maracha Terego District and Arua district which now has only Vura, Ayivu and
Madi Okollo. So I thought we need to have a students association based on our
