An ‘irresistible, awful, marvellous people’: The portrait of the Luos of East Africa
An ‘irresistible, awful, marvellous people’: The portrait of the Luos of East Africa By DAVID KAIZA THE EAST AFRICAN Posted Friday, November 7 2008 at 19:31 A whitewashed set of commemorative rings erected at the spot where, on September 22, 1877, the European explorer Emin Pasha met Omukama Kabalega, the king of Bunyoro-Kitara in Uganda, is all that remains of the latter’s palace. Behind it is the humped, grass-thatched tomb of Kabalega, whose death in 1923 marked the end of the pre-eminence of the ancient Babito dynasty. Named Mpaaro, this area just outside the western Ugandan town of Hoima is nevertheless still a place of solemn potency. The keeper of the tomb, Andrea, told me in April 2008: “People come here on their knees to pray. We pray for Obama to win the elections. If he wins, we will be very happy.” Obama’s name is unavoidable anywhere, but when pronounced at Mpaaro, thereis an added urgency to its sound… It is not altogether fanciful to say that, some 628 years ago, a ...