'What makes Africans Laugh?

Author: James. R. Tumusiime

Publisher: Fountain Publishers (2013)

Review: By Titus Kakembo                             

‘What Makes Africans Laugh’ by James Tumusiime is indeed a fast read. Given a second glance, it is a memoir but also a critique of the African’s attitude towards craftsmanship, knowledge and culture.

The narrator, through his lens, takes the reader to a colonial Uganda and the post-independence era. Baptized a literary desert, by Taban Lo Liyong, Tumusiime shows the country with what he termed “A shower.”

In it he questions the elite about what they are doing as the West traps them on an information highway and swamps them in foreign culture.

In rapid succession he asks in rhetoric what they (elite) are doing to retain their indigenous; culture, languages, reasoning, identity and political systems.

Anyone who has been in Africa will identify with Tumusiime’s experience. He artistically spices his narrative with tales of his battle to campaign for self-reliance in humour, culture, media and history.

No wonder today the publication visibly boasts huge achievements in publishing, editing and veterinary. But like fate would have it, he remains known better for a cartoon strips, Ekanya in Uganda and Bogi Benda in Kenya, that have been cracking ribs of readers with humor.

“Ekanya was born as a typical civil servant,” confided James Tumusiime during the books launch at the Sheraton. “He chased skirts at work and in pubs.”

“One time he goes home at six,” added Tumusiime. “And when his irate wife asks him why he had come home, Ekanya responds that, he had come for breakfast and to freshen up for another day.”

Murmurs went rife in the dining hall as readers shared their most amusing Ekanya, the visually fat and a bald headed man with an extensive belly. Ekanya in Ateso means a naughty person. The name is traced back to being a product of Ateker Ejalu.

“I loved that piece when he went to the pub and found a patron lying on his back and snoring like a drowning pig,” said Amos Wekesa. “And Ekanya asked the waitress to serve him what that man had drunk!”

But the book is memoir of Tumusiime’s long journey from Rwemiyengye village which is 180km out of Kampala City.

Their home was by the 1960s posh because it had an iron sheet roof and his father Yonasani Rwebuhura was a pioneer Christian convert.

“By that time the yardstick of success was measured by the number of cows in yone’s kraal and the size of one’s banana plantation,” the memoir partially reads. “Dad was the village opinion leader because of his urban exposure as a guard.”

Tumusiime writes fondly about his mother, Merab Karety, who was a traditional birth attendant and herbalist.

“We comprised of Linah Kateteyi, Dora Tofayo, Flora Katiimu and Joy Mbabazi,” Tumusiime counted his sisters. “Then there was Alfred Tumwiine, Ezra Mugyenyi and I.”

Writing about his early encounter with oral literature, Tumusiime attributes it to a blind man called Matayo who enjoyed celebrity status in the village.

He later mastered reading and speaking English from his siblings before starting school at eight years of age.

His life’s story is delivered in episodes. Like, after having scored good grades he goes to Kings College Budo. Then, he proceeded to Makerere University Kampala for veterinary studies.

In general Tumusiime’s account is a story of Uganda prior to independence, after and where it is after 50 years. He was born ten year before Uhuru but does not know the exact date.

In his narrative, Tumusiime has rubbed shoulders with numerous great leaders like; Mwalimu Julius Nyerere, Journalist Mohamed Amin, President Yoweri Museveni, former president of Nigeria Babangida and Kabaka Ronald Muwenda Mutebi II.

In short, this is a story of James Rwehabura Tumusiime born in Mbarara district in 1950. He studied Agriculture and Economics at Makerere University. But he was known better for cartoon strips of; Ekanya and Bogi Benda in Uganda and abroad.

Having returned to Uganda in 1986, he was instrumental in the establishment of The New Vision. Meanwhile he established Fountain Publishers in 1988 and recently (2008) put up, a must see Igongo Cultural Centre in Mbarara.

Endowed with a variety of experiences in rural and urban centers, meeting the ordinary people and royalty as a journalist, Tumusiime packages a neat life’s experience worth any reader’s time.  The book is available in bookshops and supermarkets.
 
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Thanks to his interest, publishing is flourishing