MUSEVENI LECTURES: THE FIRST ARAB APPEARED ABOUT 200 YEARS AGO

Added: 2026-05-28

[00:00:00]who are very much isolated.

[00:00:05]The first non-black person we saw here was in 1841.

[00:00:15]You can imagine. It's not just 200 years ago.

[00:00:18]This is the first time we saw a person called Arab. Arab.

[00:00:27]Was a man called Ibrahim from Zanzibar.

[00:00:33]Our people had never seen a non-black person. They were amazed. They didn't know that there were white people in the world.

[00:00:41]And then the first white man to come here was Hannington Speke who came in 1862.

[00:00:53]So, our interaction with the world is is recent.

[00:00:59]And if you're looking for the Africans who still have African ways here they are. You have seen some of these girls here how how beautiful they look.

[00:01:12]Who are speaking there?

[00:01:14]The ones who are speaking the the the the the directors and the the permanent secretary, those are the real real real You saw them. Didn't you see them?

[00:01:25]That is made in Uganda original.

[00:01:33]Now that goes with the culture, the languages.

[00:01:40]The languages are very rich.

[00:01:45]That's why I had to write a book capturing some of these languages.

[00:01:52]Called the so so so so like something I I forgotten what they call it. yeah, some sort of a dictionary.

[00:02:00]Capturing some of these languages.

[00:02:04]Because like when I go to foreign countries and you find something called tomato juice. Eh, juice? [clears throat] How can tomato be a juice?

[00:02:20]Tomato is not a juice. These people don't know how life is.

[00:02:26]Tomato cannot be a have a juice.

[00:02:31]Tomato is emboga.

[00:02:34]How can emboga have juice? Ombisi.

[00:02:39]But these people think it is juice.

[00:02:42]Ombisi.

[00:02:44]And this is because of the language.

[00:02:47]Because for us we have got a word for vegetable.

[00:02:50]We've got a word for juice.

[00:02:53]Ombisi. We've got a word for fruits.

[00:02:57]The only thing that can produce juice are bananas.

[00:03:02]Maybe sugarcane.

[00:03:08]Fruits can the mango oranges.

[00:03:13]But but uh tomatoes.

[00:03:17]Okushuma. Okushuma.

[00:03:20]Machine.

[00:03:23]As opposed to Okunyuka.

[00:03:25]Okunyuka.

[00:03:28]Abaganda kunyuka bakwita batya mu Luganda?

[00:03:32]Okukola bakwita batya?

[00:03:37]Okusogola mwenge, ah? Bakwita kusogola?

[00:03:41]Sikyakusogola?

[00:03:43]Abaganda bali mu obubaka obwa nani?

[00:03:47]Omuganda dalali ludawa?

[00:03:56]>> Your Excellency.

[00:04:03]Cannot be the machine So, the language languages culture Then you come to to the foods.

[00:04:26]This Africa can save the world from bad foods.

[00:04:31]The the young girl was talking about to pineapples.

[00:04:40]When I went to Washington, they brought something called pineapple.

[00:04:46]But when I put it in the mouth, I could feel the the urea.

[00:05:00]I could feel the I said, "Wait, this tomato coming this pineapple that is from Hawaii."

[00:05:07]Small but full of of of full of I think for the chemicals fertilizers But here the foods are so so so rich, so original.

[00:05:26]I am now going to be 82 years old. I only eat in the our indigenous food. I never eat any I don't eat the rice. You are the ones who eat the rice.

[00:05:38]Me I'm eat I eat our own food. So, it's very important to inform the world. If you take like millet, millet is the richest food in life.

[00:05:50]Apart from milk, of course. You know you remember amata.

[00:05:54]Agano gogoliyaho.

[00:05:57]Because millet is a cereal which has got a lot of protein a lot of carbohydrate but also iron iron.

[00:06:18]If you look at rice, you look at uh wheat, I don't think they have that combination.

[00:06:27]So, therefore when we are inviting we are now coming also the issue of of medicine.

[00:06:37]Our young people who grow up in the villages seeing what their parents were doing many of them have have gone to to modern universities.

[00:06:51]They are highly qualified scientists.

[00:06:54]And they have found a lot of they have modernized what we have been using traditionally.

[00:07:01]And it's very very effective.

[00:07:04]You'll be getting more you'll be getting more stories about that.

[00:07:07]So, therefore when we are talking of Uganda as a tourism destination it is for comfort.

[00:07:22]If you want to live comfortably the only irritant has been the mos- the mosquito, these insects.

[00:07:30]But we know how to control them. I'm sure here you don't see any mosquito here.

[00:07:35]Because we we can kill them.

[00:07:37]Don't have to to be there.

[00:07:39]Otherwise, it's very comfortable to to to live here.

[00:07:44]Then the culture, the food, and now as the PS was saying, we have added the peace, the peace in the country, and law and order.

[00:08:02]So, therefore, the It's good that you have come.

[00:08:11]I need to tell you for Kagwa with her group, we are already a middle-income country.

[00:08:18]We are a lower middle-income country.

[00:08:20]So, we are not struggling to become a middle-income country. We are already a lower middle-income country.

[00:08:26]>> [clears throat] >> The struggle now is to make it a high middle-income country in the next few years, and a first world country in the medium term. That's what we are struggling with.

[00:08:43]And it is easy for us other than sleeping.

[00:08:49]But I needed to inform the our visitors that these Ugandans are fond of sleeping. Be careful about them.

[00:08:58]Beaucoup dormir, they say in Français.

[00:09:02]Beaucoup dormir, they sleep a lot. They Life is so easy here. Here, fools don't die.

[00:09:10]In other parts of the country, fools will die.

[00:09:13]But here you will get a fool who doesn't do any work, going around eating from relatives.

[00:09:20]He he he's there. He doesn't he die.

[00:09:23]So, life is easy here.

[00:09:27]Some of the people don't work hard.

[00:09:30]But the the the potential is so huge.

[00:09:34]Our economy has got four sectors.

[00:09:38]Sector one is commercial agriculture.

[00:09:44]Our people are very good in agriculture.

[00:09:47]But they have been doing agriculture for home consumption.

[00:09:53]What they call subsistence.

[00:09:58]For the last 60 years, I have been involved in persuading the people near me to go from subsistence farming to commercial farming.

[00:10:10]Produce for for for the home, for the food, and also for the pocket.

[00:10:19]And do so with a chibalo.

[00:10:21]A chibalo is the essential economics.

[00:10:27]So, agriculture is very lucrative lucrative here.

[00:10:34]Then you have got manufacturing.

[00:10:39]Now, tourism is in services.

[00:10:45]Tourism, professional services, transport, all those, music, and entertainment.

[00:10:57]All those are part of the services sector.

[00:11:00]And then the ICT.

[00:11:05]So, therefore, by you coming here, you will help us to advance our economy to high middle income level status, and first world country.

[00:11:21]Because of the colonial fragmentation, the borders are not rational. You find there's a lot of landlocked countries in Africa because of the colonial borders.

[00:11:35]But that's why politically we've been working with our neighbors, Kenya, Tanzania, Rwanda, Burundi, Congo, South Sudan, Somalia, to reassemble this part of the world and the whole of Africa into one market.

[00:11:59]That's why you hear you heard us playing two national two anthems.

[00:12:03]One anthem is Uganda anthem, the other one is East African anthem.

[00:12:09]East African community anthem. That's why you heard us playing two anthems.

[00:12:13]We're very conscious.

[00:12:17]We've been moving to working to remove the distortions of colonialism.

[00:12:25]I told you that we did not have much contact with the the non-Africans until 1841.

[00:12:34]But our ancestors had contact with the coast.

[00:12:39]People from Zanzibar through Bagamoyo, through Tabora, through Karagwe, we were coming here.

[00:12:52]Since time immemorial, excavation work has shown some items which were imported here in 900 AD from Mesopotamia, what is now Iraq.

[00:13:07]This was because of the trade between the coast and the hinterland, the internal part of Africa.

[00:13:16]So, we have been working to reassemble that connected trading area.

[00:13:27]And it is helping us because many of the products we produce the internal market in Uganda is not enough.

[00:13:34]We sell them in the region and in the whole of Africa.

[00:13:41]So, therefore in the new government I would advise them to make it easier for the tourists to come and because apparently one of the I don't know why they've been giving short visas of 3 months.

[00:13:59]But the Americans complained say we give you visa of 3 years that the Americans give us visa of 3 years and you give them of only 3 months. Why?

[00:14:11]What are you worried about?

[00:14:14]Give him of 3 years multiple multiple re-entry visa. Let him go, come back if you want.

[00:14:24]As long as he's paying his bills, what what are are you worried about his pocket? What is your concern?

[00:14:30]He will not come without money. He will come with money to to pay for his bills.

[00:14:36]So, these short visas are not I don't think I don't know why people is you people you are insisting on them.

[00:14:42]We are going to discuss with that.

[00:14:46]Now, finally I would happily go to the park with with you people.

[00:14:52]Just organize.

[00:14:56]I'll come and join you.

[00:14:58]With these few words what do I do?

[00:15:03]I declare what now?

[00:15:08]Your Excellency, you're officially opening the Pearl of Africa Tourism Expo. I officially open the Pearl of of Africa Expo. Thank you very much.

[00:15:21]Your Excellency, can we warmly receive His Excellency's remarks, ladies and gentlemen?

[00:15:30]Your Excellency, if you can sit for a minute, and I know you have another program. Let's sit, ladies and gentlemen.

[00:15:36]Your Excellency, we have some special guests, and I want them just to come in front so they can you can see them because you will even love the way they are dressed.

[00:15:44]Our Pan-African cultural delegation, the cultural leaders from the Pan-African society, please come.

[00:15:52]Delegation from South Africa, from Ghana, from Eswatini, of course from our very own Uganda, Costa Rica, the United Kingdom, and Barbados.

[00:16:06]Please come.

[00:16:07]You look lovely. I want His Excellency to see you.

[00:16:11]So he knows we have special guests from across the world.

[00:16:15]Your Excellency, they are here to commemorate the World Cultural Day that will be happening tomorrow as part of a bigger delegation. And so we want to receive them, members of the cultural leaders Pan-African society.

[00:16:29]Please we'll stay near here. Let's not go too far.

[00:16:33]We want His Excellency to see you so you can spread out. Your Excellency, these are your people from across the world, South Africa, Barbados, United Kingdom, Ghana, Costa Rica, Eswatini, and of course Uganda. Your Excellency, these are our visitors.