This is the personal story of a young man whom I had the pleasure of meeting and getting to know in Uganda. His story like so many, having to survive day to day horrendous nightmarish experiences. I can only applaud his inner strength, tenacity and enduring spirit.
name is Tusiime Kenneth from Uganda in East Africa. I was brought up in a small village in West Central Uganda in Kibutamo village located in Rakai District. We are 7 children in our family. I have 2 brothers and 4 sisters. Of all the children in our family, I am the second eldest. We are 2 children from the same father and mother and the other children come from my step mothers. Our eldest sister comes from another mother and three youngest come from another mother.
I was born in the year, 2000 in a struggling family in Kampala District in a slum known as Mengo-Kisenyi. My mum got married at the age of 14 and gave birth to me. Two years later, she got a bone complication having given birth to the 2 of us and became very ill. Kansiime Mercy is my younger sister from the same mother. After our mother became ill, our father abandoned us and left us alone in a rented house. My sister was 4-years-old and I was 6-years-old. My mother did everything she could to take care for us. She roasted maize, washed clothes and did all sorts of menial work to see that we could survive. Life had become a daily survival of courage but after 2 years our mum decided that she would go back to her community in Kibutamo Village. Her home where she had been ostracized after she had got pregnant with me. At first she was welcomed back and things seemed ok but it didn’t last long.
Kibutamo Village is a small village located on the borders of Rakai District. Most of the people in this village are small scale farmers and they grow food for a living and to fulfill their other basic needs. The village has about 80,000 people and only one government aided primary school. There is no medical centre in this village and for one to get medicine, they have to walk about 6 miles (10 km) to the nearest clinic that is always loaded with people and lacks medicine. It’s an insurmountable challenge to even get clean water.
For 3 months we were left to our own devices albeit it became more and more complicated soon after. Both our mother, my sister and I were harassed and hated, our mother was blamed for giving birth to us by village members. They also thought I was bewitched and at 9 years-old almost died. Thank God that I am still alive however I sustained scars from the operation on my belly and seasonal wounds.
After this happened, my mother abandoned us and she got married to another man and left us at our grandparents’ place. One year later she died of HIV/AIDS which she contracted from another man. As if life couldn’t get worse for us as we were totally to remain half orphans. This is the day I thought that God doesn’t care anymore about his people. During her burial, our father appeared and convinced our grandfather that he had ‘changed’ and was able to take care of us. I regret the day we left Kibutamo village back to Kampala, however this was to become our new learning opportunity. We left and joined our father in Masajja and joined a school known as MB Academic War Junior School. We were being taken care of by our Aunt while our father kept coming for us at school in the evening.
It was 2009, when our father married another woman when things changed and we had to face life as if we were adults. Immediately after she had been brought home, she started gradually denying us food as we reported to our father who couldn’t listen and always thought we spoke falsely of his wife. I remember the day my sister and I were beaten so badly having sustained wounds. We had eaten food from the pantry having come back from school famished. It was difficult for us to concentrate at school on empty stomachs and we never wanted to go back home because we always felt a relief at school away from the torture we received at home. An elderly woman called Jajja Kalyango in the town of Masajja can narrate to you how we were mistreated while we still lived in that place as she once saved us from a flogging.
A year later, we shifted and moved to Gangu since we were renting. We moved away from our Aunt who saved us sometimes from our step-mum though not often enough. I was bright in class and loved by the teachers gaining full bursaries. Our lives in Gangu were fraught with difficulties. We joined a new school called Joy Standard Junior School. Gangu is located on a hill in Wakiso District and in 2010 there were water shortages. Our father would leave the house at 5:00 AM and immediately our step mum would awaken us beating us with sticks. Then carrying 20 litre jerry cans (full can weigh 40 lbs ) to fetch water up to a distance of 7.5 miles (12 km) which was brutal. Whether sick or well, this was routine everyday apart from Saturday since we got go to church. We started going with an extra pair of clothes in our bags, and as we reached the half-way point before we got to school, we changed our route and walked to Kampala, a friend of our mum we knew there. That’s a distance of about 13.5 miles (22 km). Why one earth did we do this you might ask? Because we feared that when we got back home we would be tortured. My sister and I suffered for about 2 years. My step-mum threatened to kill me because she was afraid that I would become the heir to our families father’s property. I constantly thought about committing suicide because I was tired of life. It is my sister who saved me.
While I was in school P.5 and my sister in P.3, our father was involved in a fatal accident and he died leaving us behind. There was no more home for us, apart from the street where we spent almost 2 years begging to be able to eat. However, we always believed in education and during this time we were living with our mum’s friend who couldn’t afford to take care of us. We again moved back to our village in Kibutamo where we were welcomed and lived with our grandfather who later died in 2011 leaving us with our Uncle Mr. Huzairuh. I joined the closest school that was 6 miles (10 km) away called St. James Lwankoni Primary School and my sister joined Mitondo Islamic Primary School. Rakai District became very infamous for child sacrifice and there were many reported cases of cannibalism. Once we were in our homes by 6:00 PM we never played outside with other children. Even today there is still no medical centre in Kibutamo Village.
I remember the day I got a severe migraine-headache that made me bleed every morning. I had to walk the journey of about 10km to the nearest heath centre together with my uncle only to walk home unable to find medication. I can’t forget that time, it became a nightmare to me. I spent about a month bedridden until the herbal remedies worked. Clean water was too far to go for and so every morning before going to school we had to fetch water from a pond. We would be lucky to eat one potato and then walk to school without shoes. After walking unimaginable distances by the time we got to school we couldn’t concentrate. We sat in class on an empty stomach, and you expect a child to learn?
I was kind to my fellow students since we were just trying to survive the day and at many times they shared whatever they had with me. No one in the school had shoes and some of us had had jiggers (tiny mite whose parasitic larvae live on or under the skin where they cause dermatitis and sometimes transmit scrub typhus). There was no electricity in my village and I remember some nights when I had to read books under the moon light outside while mosquitoes bit through my ragged patched clothes.
I was a bright child though and it was during my P.6, a former head teacher of our school noticed me and took me to his school Njara Hill Primary School where I completed my P.7. He referred me to a fellow head teacher in Lwengo, who gave me a bursary at St. Francis Senior Secondary School in Lwengo District. I studied for only a term and I got a sponsorship to study in Kampala. This is where I joined Extreme High School, a school that looks after orphans and children who come from less privileged families. I learnt all one could learn about life. We used to learn critical thinking, hands-on skills like aquaponics and hydroponics which greatly inspired me to learn agriculture. We could have all the freedom we needed, grow our own food and didn’t have to pay school fees.
I met the Director Mr. Segawa Ephraim a God-fearing man who taught me communication skills and creativity. I was inspired by what he does and together with a team of 4 others started up an organization called Save Children’s Lives Africa. Mr. Segawa accepted that he would be our patron. After a year, when I was in S.2, my sister joined the school. Due to the good performance and my talent of singing, I was noticed by Najjanankumbi Young Christian School in Kampala to join the school choir and I received a bursary to study there. While here I got an idea to start caring for the children and the elderly in my community and while in S.3, I began ‘Hope for African Mtoto’, I called Owen Mugumya, a friend I knew in Kampala through music and was an Ambassador of Acts of Love and he joined the team with another 2 people in our village. During my S.4 holidays, I gathered a group of youths and collected some money which we used to grow food and sold some. We shared the money and used the remaining to register the organization as a community based organization (CBO).
With my team, we started training children in farming, aquaponics and taught them to sing. Most of these children were from less privileged families and orphaned children. Some were living with HIV/AIDs. We started with 20 children until we reached 209 children and were able to mobilize some money and scholastic materials, so that the children could be enrolled in the 2 government aided schools that had been built in the area. Some of the children were taken by their guardians but due to the strict orders and guidelines by the government. We started with 18 families each 10 children allowing them the chance to grow as other children as a family and community. Today we take care of 79 children by providing them food, school requirements and sponsorships. However, COVID-19 has affected us and we have reduced the number of the children we care for.
After my vacations, I joined another school known as Namasumbi Secondary School where I finished my A-Levels and because I had promised myself to solve the challenge of the lack of a medical centre in my village, I did Biology, Chemistry, Mathematics and Computer Studies BCM/ICT. It was after high school that I looked for a scholarship to be able to continue to University. I found the Social Innovation Academy; an organization that empowers marginalized youth to create their own jobs. At this center, it is where I founded the Youth Innovation Hub, a for-impact startup that empowers marginalized youth in underserved communities along with refugees 18–30.
We have been able to empower 30 youths who are undergoing an intensive training program, to help implement and structure the ideas of young people into social businesses and prepare them for seed funding and other partnering opportunities. In addition to this, I cofounded Big Baby Organic Foods. A social enterprise fighting the high child mortality rate due to malnutrition through its innovative fermented organic foods. The company now has a capacity to dry and make 100 kg per week though we are lacking a space for production. I am enthusiastic about learning new ways of developing communities, start-ups, businesses and innovations that could make humanity better. I believe we have skills across various economic and social fields and have connections that can make our project more impactful to the community. We are searching for opportunities, funding, partnerships and passionate individuals that can champion and help us build sustainable economic resilient communities. Through disrupting the obsolete model of education that has kept the unemployment rate of the people in our country at 83%, with a new holistic approach that changes purpose, pain and passion into people centered businesses.
I’m so grateful to Mr. Vincent Lyn for the opportunity to tell my story to the world and your work that you do to make the world a better place. I believe that if a small group cares and takes action, small acts of love can give many people suffering in this world a better life.
For more information about the initiatives Tusiime Kenneth is doing click on links below:
https://www.facebook.com/orphanagesafrica
https://www.facebook.com/YINNOH
https://www.facebook.com/bigbabyorganic
Vincent Lyn
CEO/Founder at We Can Save Children
Director of Creative Development at African Views Organization
Economic & Social Council at United Nations