Hostname: page-component-cd9895bd7-q99xh Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-23T09:13:01.420Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

The Sub-Imperialism of the Baganda

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  22 January 2009

A. D. Roberts
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Extract

Among all the African kingdoms to survive the Partition intact, Buganda is conspicuous for the way in which European overrule, so far from obstructing, positively accentuated the pattern of her pre-Colonial history. With regard to Buganda's political development, this continuity has already received a good deal of comment. Less emphasized, but intimately related to her internal continuity, is the perpetuation of Buganda's imperialist past, especially in the guise of Ganda participation in the extension of British influence throughout the Protectorate of Uganda.

Type
Research Article
Information
The Journal of African History , Volume 3 , Issue 3 , November 1962 , pp. 435 - 450
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1962

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

1 My research in Uganda was carried out in 1960–1 on a Leverhulme Overseas Research Scholarship. Dr Roland Oliver and Professor K. Ingham drew my attention to the topic here considered, and I am grateful to Dr Oliver, Professor Philip D. Curtin, and Mr M. J. Wright for their helpful criticism.Google Scholar

2 E.g., Apter, D. E., The Political Kingdom in Uganda (Princeton, 1961);Google ScholarLow, D. A. and Pratt, R. C., Buganda and British Overrule: Two Studies (Oxford, 1960);Google ScholarLow, D. A., The British and Uganda, 1862–1900 (Oxford D. Phil. thesis, 1957).Google Scholar

3 Lugard to I.B.E.A. Coy., 7/1/91. Parliamentary Papers (P.P.), 1892, LVI.Google Scholar

4 Ford, J. and Hall, R. de Z., ‘The History of Karagwe’, Tanganyika Notes and Records, 12 1947; Fallers, L. A., Bantu Bureaucracy (Cambridge, 1956), 38.Google Scholar

5 Low and Pratt, op. cit., 36, 72.Google Scholar

6 Cf. Berkeley to Anderson, 18/12/95. Entebbe Secretariat Archives (E.S.A.), A34/I.Google Scholar

7 Berkeley to Teman, 15/9/96. Further Correspondence relating to East Africa (F.C.), XLVII, 270–1.Google Scholar

8 Cf. Apter, op. cit., 86.Google Scholar

9 Cox, A. H., ‘The Growth and Expansion of Buganda’, Uganda Journal, xiv (1950), ii;Google ScholarSouthwold, M., Bureaucracy and Chiefship in Buganda (Kampala, 1960).Google Scholar Cf. also Fallers, L. A., ‘Despotism, Status Culture, and Social Mobility in an African Kingdom’, Comparative Studies in Society and History, ii (1959–1960), i.Google Scholar

10 Low, D. A., Religion and Society in Buganda, 1875–1900 (Kampala, 1957);Google ScholarWrigley, C. C., ‘The Christian Revolution in Buganda’, Comparative Studies in Society and History, ii (1959–1960), i.Google Scholar

11 Low and Pratt, op. cit., 128–38.Google Scholar

12 London Gazette, 3/7/196;Google ScholarJohnston to Salisbury, 1/2/00. F.C., LXXI, 1.Google Scholar

13 Low and Pratt, op. cit., 45–6.Google Scholar

14 ‘Preliminary Report on the Protectorate of Uganda’, enclosed in Johnston to Salisbury, 27/4/00, P.P., 1900, LVI;Google ScholarLugard, F. J. D., The Rise of our East African Empire (London, 1893), 649–50.Google Scholar

15 Thomas, H. B., ‘Capax Imperii’, Uganda Journal, vi (1939), iii;Google ScholarLawrance, J. C. D., The Iteso (Oxford, 1957), 17–22.Google Scholar

16 Welbourn, F. B., East African Rebels (London, 1961), 218.Google Scholar

17 Gibb to Colvile, 10/6/94, E.S.A. A2/2.Google Scholar

18 Johnston to Salisbury, 6/4/00, F.C., LXII, 156;Google ScholarJohnston to Fowler, 25/5/00, E.S.A. A5/10.Google Scholar

19 Fowler, memo., 25/6/00. E.S.A. A4/29.Google Scholar

20 Jackson to Lansdowne, 25/2/02, F.C., LXVIII, 196;Google Scholarcf. Kakunguru to Sadler, 3/8/02, E.S.A. A10/1.Google Scholar

21 List by Walker of December 1901, E.S.A. A10/2.Google Scholar

22 Tucker, A. R., Eighteen Years in Uganda and East Africa (London, 1908), 11, 316.Google Scholar

23 Boyle, memo., 19/1/04; Boyle to Sadler, 15/2/04, E.S.A. A10/3.Google Scholar

24 Boyle to Sadler, 7/5/04, E.S.A. A10/3.Google Scholar

25 Sadler to Cubitt, 2/9/05, E.S.A. A11/2.Google Scholar

26 Baskerville, 13/7/94, Church Missionary Intelligencer, Jan. 1895.Google Scholar

27 Fallers, L. A., in Richards, A. I. (ed.), East African Chiefs (London, 1960), 85.Google Scholar

28 Welbourn, F. B., op. cit., ch. 3, passim.Google Scholar

29 Correspondence between Boyle and Wilson, March and April 1907. Entebbe Secretariat Minute Papers (S.M.P.), 07/82.Google Scholar

30 Lawrance, op. cit., 33–4.Google Scholar

31 Driberg, J. H., The Lango (London, 1923),Google ScholarIngham, K., ‘British Administration in Lango District, 3909–35’, Uganda Journal, xix (1955), ii.Google Scholar

32 E.g., Bell, memo., 18/9/08, S.M.P. 08/1520.Google Scholar

33 Knowles to Chief Secretary, 16/3/09, S.M.P. 08/1520.Google Scholar

34 Postlethwaite, J. R., I Look Back (London, 1947), 31–4; Bukedi district report, Nov. 1912; Teso district report, March 1913.Google Scholar

35 Eastern Province annual and monthly reports.Google Scholar

36 Wright, M. J., ‘The Early Life of Rwot Isaya Ogwangguji, M.B.E.,’ Uganda Journal, xxii (1958), ii;Google Scholar ‘The Life of Yakobo Adoko … as told to Huddle, J. G.’, Uganda Journal, xxi (1957), ii.Google Scholar

37 Information from Mr E. P. Engulu, M.B.E.Google Scholar

38 Wright, A. C. A., ‘Notes on the Social Organization of the Iteso’, Uganda Journal, ix (1942), ii.Google Scholar

39 La Fontaine, J., in Richards, A. I., op. cit., 262–3; 265.Google Scholar

40 Information from Mr B. A. Ogot.Google Scholar

41 Lawrance, op. cit., 22;Google ScholarFallers, L. A., in Richards, A. I., op. cit., 84.Google Scholar

42 Perryman to Spire, 27/9/11. Mbale archives.Google Scholar

43 Information from Messrs Erongot, P., Kabazi, L., Mboga, S., and Gwambwa, M.— the last two former Baganda agents.Google ScholarCf. Melland, F. H. and Cholmeley, E. H., Through the Heart of Africa (London, 1912), 220–1;Google ScholarLawrance, op. cit., 33–5;Google ScholarBell to Crewe, 81/9/08, P.P., 1909, LIX.Google Scholar

44 Information from Mr Engulu; Bukedi district report, 1907–1908, S.M.P. 08/859.Google Scholar

45 Taylor, J. V., The Growth of the Church in Buganda (London, 1958), 64–6.Google Scholar

46 Gale, H. P., Uganda and the Mill Hill Fathers (London, 1959), 217–27, 315–16.Google Scholar

47 Tucker, op. cit. (2nd ed. 1911), 11, 343;Google ScholarGale, op. cit., 283.Google Scholar

48 Oliver, Roland, The Missionary Factor in East Africa (London, 1952), 191. Up to about 1950 most of the pastors in the Native Anglican Church in eastern Uganda were still Baganda, as is the present Bishop of Soroti, the Rt Rev. S. S. Tomusange, who kindly allowed me to consult a typescript ‘History of the Upper Nile Diocese’, by Miss A. M. Bishop and Miss D. Ruffell.Google Scholar

49 Tucker, op. cit., 11, 213–14;Google ScholarRoscoe, J., The Northern Bantu (Cambridge, 1915), 198.Google Scholar

50 Wilson to Johnston, 6/g/00, E.S.A. A12/1.Google Scholar

51 Wilson to Ternan, 8/2/99, E.S.A. A4/16, cited in Low and Pratt, op. cit., 147.Google Scholar

52 Bell, minute of 26/4/08. Ankole archives, Mbarara.Google Scholar

53 Wilson, to Sadler, , 28/9/05, E.S.A. A 12/7; The System of Chieftainships of Ankole (Entebbe, 1907), 10–11.Google Scholar

54 Wrigley, C. C., Crops and Wealth in Uganda (Kampala, 1959), 50.Google Scholar

55 Wilson to Jackson, 14/8/01, E.S.A. A12/1;Google ScholarKabazzi, J. K. Miti, A Short History of Buganda … (c. 1938; English translation in Makerere College Library and in that of the School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London), 786.Google Scholar This source is especially valuable for Bunyoro and Toro in the early twentieth century. See also Lwanga, P. M. K., Obulama bw'Omutaka J. K. Miti Kabazzi (Kampala, 1954). I am grateful for information given by the present Omukama, Sir Tito Winyi, c.B.E., the Katikkiro, Mr Kwebiha, and Mr J. Nyakatura.Google Scholar

56 Wilson to Sadler, 20/3/04, E.S.A. A12/5;Google ScholarLwanga, op. cit., 13, 22.Google Scholar

57 Wilson to Sadler, 14/10/05, E.S.A. A12/7.Google Scholar

58 Mika Fataki to Apolo Kagwa, 7/3/07, S.M.P. 07/267.Google Scholar

59 Enquiry into Land Tenure and the Kibanja System in Bunyoro: Report of the Committee (Entebbe, 1935);Google ScholarBeattie, J. H. M., Bunyoro (New York, 1960), 37–9.Google Scholar

60 Galt to Sadler, 4/9/02, E.S.A. A15/2; Wilson to Wyndham, 31/10/02, E.S.A. A8/2. By 1911 there were at least 12,000 Baganda in Ankole (total population c. 225,000), and this number has remained fairly constant ever since.Google Scholar

61 Tucker, op. cit., 11, 239. I am grateful to Mr L. Kamugungunu, M.B.E., for information about Mbaguta.Google Scholar

62 Williams, F. Lukyn, ‘Nuwa Mbaguta’, Uganda Journal, x (1946), ii;Google ScholarMorris, H. F., ‘The Making of Ankole’, Uganda Journal, xxi (1957), i.Google Scholar

63 Knowles to Wilson, 25/7/04. Ankole archives, Mbarara.Google Scholar

64 Wilson, ‘Report on the Enquiry …’, 30/7/05, E.S.A. A12/6; Knowles to Watson, 9/9/06, E.S.A. A14/3; Ankole district report, 1925.Google Scholar

65 Grant to Chief Secretary, 13/8/13, in Appendices to Reports of the Committee [on] Native Land Settlement … (Entebbe, 1915); list in System of Chieftainships of Ankole.Google Scholar

66 Lloyd, A. B., Apolo of the Pygmy Forest (London, 1923), 27–8;Google ScholarTaylor, B. K., in Richards, A. I., op. cit., 135.Google Scholar

67 Johnston to Jackson, 10/7/00, E.S.A. A5/10.Google Scholar

68 For this and the following paragraph see Report on the Enquiry into the Grievances of the Mukama and People of Toro (Entebbe, 1926); and the relevant Western Province annual reports.Google Scholar

69 Richards, A. I., op. cit., 136, n. I.Google Scholar

70 Baxter, P. T. W., in Richards, A. I., op. cit., 281–2. I am grateful for information given by Messrs P. Ngorongoza, T. Rwomusama, and H. Seboa (the latter a former Muganda Agent). The annual district and provincial reports are the main documentary source for this and the following paragraph.Google Scholar

71 There was in fact one such attempt in 1958, but it proved impossible to find a Rukigaspeaking Muganda in Teso. Jervoise to D.C. Teso, 29/11/18 and 20/1/19. Teso archives, Soroti.Google Scholar

72 Baxter, in A. I. Richards, op. cit., 286.Google Scholar

73 E.g., Richards, A. I., op. cit., 41;Google ScholarIngham, K., ‘British Administration’, Uganda journal xix (1955), ii,Google ScholarFallers, Bantu Bureaucracy, 145–6.Google Scholar

74 Grant to Wilson, 6/5/07, S.M.P. 07/618. Though the stratification of chiefs introduced in northern Uganda was fundamentally the same as elsewhere the only Baganda to serve there were three agents in Acholi during the 1914–18 War. Cf. correspondence between District Commissioners of Teso and Chua, in Teso archives, Soroti.Google Scholar

75 Wilson, ‘Report on the Enquiry …’, 30/7/05, E.S.A. A12/6.Google Scholar

76 Mair, L. P., ‘Buganda Land Tenure’, Africa, vi (1933), ii;Google ScholarRichards, A. I., in Richards, A. I. (ed.), Economic Development and Tribal Change (Cambridge, 1954), 172.Google Scholar

77 The Kabaka's government disapproved of colonization as a loss of revenue. Fowler to Sadler, 7/4/04, E.S.A. A8/4.Google Scholar

78 Jackson to Lansdowne, 19/3/02, F.C., LXIX, 66.Google Scholar

79 Knowles to Sadler, 24/7/05, E.S.A. A14/2;Google ScholarCook, A. R., Uganda Memories (London, 1945), 210, 213.Google Scholar

80 See for this paragraph Powesland, P. G., in Richards, A. I. (ed.), Economic Development and Tribal Change, 17–22;Google Scholar A. I. Richards, ibid. 64–73.

81 Mair, L. P., An African People in the Twentieth Century (London, 1934), 11, cited by Powesland, loc. cit. 22.Google Scholar

82 Thomas, H. B. and Scott, R., Uganda (Oxford, 1935), 83.Google Scholar Despite a wave of purist indirect rule theory in the 1930's, there has been no successful attempt to replace the Buganda system by truly indigenous institutions. Cf. Lawrance, op. cit., 35–6;Google Scholar‘The Position of Chiefs in Local Government in Uganda’, Journal of African Administration, viii (1956), IV, 189.Google Scholar

83 One Lango chief in 1911 wished to become ‘Kabaka’ of Lango and in 1949 there was popular agitation for the creation of a Lango leader with the same status as the kings of western Uganda. Huddle, J. G., ‘Life of Yakobo Adoko’, Uganda Journal, xxi (1957), ii, 186, 188.Google ScholarCf. Pratt, R. C., ‘Nationalism in Uganda’, Political Studies, ix (1961), ii, ii, 177.Google Scholar

84 Thomas and Scott, op. cit., 97;Google ScholarSirHall, John to Colonial Secretary, 29/8/47, quoted by Apter, op. cit., 237.Google Scholar

85 Wallis, C. A. G., Report of an Inquiry into African Local Government in the Protectorate of Uganda (Entebbe, 1953).Google ScholarCf. Ingham, K., The Making of Modern Uganda (London, 1958), 262.Google Scholar