Friday, June 25, 2010
J C Kiwanuka fare thee well (weraba) Petitions
What Dr. G.H. Kkolokolo wrote about the Late J C Kiwanuka on his 90th Birthday – 27/7/2009
Let me use this great occasion, when we solemnly mark Prof J. C. Kiwanuka’s 90th anniversary, to say some thing about that special class at St Mary’s College Kisubi, the class that brought uppermost honour and dignity to SMACK, to Uganda and to East Africa. That was our first A-Level group (1959 – 1960) of our HSC section, Prof. J.C. Kiwanuka’s brainchild! It was a special contingent composed of thirty very wonderful students who had shone brilliantly in their O-Levels at their distinctive colleges of origin: SMACK, St Henry’s, Namiryango, St Leo’s Kyegobe, St Peter’s Tororo, St Aloysius Nyapea, some students from the Seychelles, Kenya, Tanganyika. This very eminent inaugural group, whose classes / tuition started slightly earlier than in other sister colleges which had also been authorized by the then British Protectorate Government to open an HSC section, similarly with 30 students each (Buddo, Makerere College School, and Mbale S.S.S.) was a very marvellous team. And the inauguration gave them added privileges that made them look more special than other students who literary feared them to the extent of even nodding to them as they passed! They had blue blazers whereas for the rest of the college the blazer was black, they sat in the upper section of the refectory, they slept in the western wing of Kiwanuka House, they received a pocket money allowance and never paid any school fees, they never washed even a simple utensil after meal, they never did any manual labour, they could go out on Saturdays after simply noting their names in an open absence-register, and they had their elegant building to house their classrooms, their very well-equipped library and their private study cubicles each one accommodating six students. That HSC block, constructed by Rev Bro Paul Bourget, then a simple member of staff, immediately became a legend when O-Level students began to humorously refer to it as a “Beyond the Atlantic”. In other words crossing the Atlantic would mean being admitted to our HSC where one would enjoy some privilege. True, since its occupants were indeed the envy of even their companions who had been admitted for the somehow equivalent Intermediate pre-degree course at Makerere University which was offered not by Cambridge University but by London University. The HSCs also had the best teachers in the region since many of them were even regularly requested to give a hand at Makerere or in other institutions and a good number of them were subsequently recruited to top gear positions in government and other leading institutions!
The section with its newly arrived S5 was inaugurated with pomp. I was at Savio and we had an invitation to attend. The ceremony took place right in front of the HSC Building in the presence of all students with the new HSCs in their blue blazers receiving a bewildered gaze from every angle, many eminent personalities on Kisubi Hill were also present, and a skyline of prominent notables who included the then Archbishop of Lubaga, His Grace Joseph L. Cabana, the Great Benedicto Kiwanuka who by then was the region’s shining political star, Dr Josephine Nnambooze the newly qualified first woman doctor in the whole of East Africa and whose presence on any important occasion wouldn’t pass unnoticed, Rev Fr Modeste Raux, founder of SMACK, Rev Bro Arthur Greenwood, the much celebrated Provincial Superior of the Brothers of Christian Instruction, many leading OBs and European guests from Kampala and Entebbe. The H/M, Rev Bro Oscar, delivered a very brilliant speech which moved every attendee and guest; he then called on the Uganda Protectorate Director of Education to officially declare open the section. He too, before proceeding to acts, gave a very moving speech praising St Mary’s College Kisubi as a very original and intelligent school. He then performed the official ceremony by cutting the “rope” and then by opening the main entrance with a special key. Then guests and students began flocking inside the elegant building to admire the interior set-up, notably the cubicles which were to help turn that special edifice into the breeding ground of some of Africa’s topmost brand intellectuals, geniuses and pragmatic edifiers! And outright, SMACK’s first HSC Section had set the stage for this reality! Let’s now get a glimpse of this wonderful group which made history for East Africa, Uganda and SMACK by a massing far more than half of all certificates awarded by Cambridge to Uganda and by heaping up piles of Principal Level passes in virtually every subject!
By Dr. George Herman Kkolokolo
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