By Dr John W Bahana (PhD).

My 90-year-old mother, (bless her soul), once asked me a question, I swear, I could not find an answer and have failed to find one to date.

She, of protestant faith, asked, why, according to Radio Uganda news, transmitted all the way to rural Kisoro, the Pope had been shot and near fatally injured, and Catholics around the world, were being asked to pray for his health and recovery from the severe injuries from gunshots by a certain Ali Agca.

She further asked me why the Vatican was, instead not spearheading prayers for the Pope to speed up his journey to join Jesus and God His father in heaven. This was in 1982 and the Pope who was severely injured was John Paul II.

Come the year 2022 and Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI died, aged 95. Just before he died, word had buzzed around about his deteriorating health. 

Three days earlier, the reigning Pope had warned the Catholic faithful that his predecessor was gravely ill and he requested for prayers, not for his safe journey to join Jesus, but for his recovery.

When a few years after 90 years of life my mother passed on, she had, in her last days, expressed the wish that we, her children, should not waste money for hospitalisation; for it was time up for her. I still admire her courage.

When my mother passed on, she had insisted that Jesus or no Jesus; Heaven or no heaven, no money should be spent by his children, now able, to shoulder hospital bills for her time was up.

My mother’s question had sent me searching about these Popes and why Christianity and believers in Christ have propagated and pushed the theory of heavenly powers to the vulnerable Ugandans.

It is a theory, enhanced by Colonialism that not one single person has shown or demonstrated that actually heaven is a physical entity that is reachable, touchable and demonstrable.

It remains a dream for millions, for after all, dreaming is a target phenomenon for philosophy of mind. It is a theory of an afterlife. It keeps humans to remain positive for life on earth, however challenging, however despicable, on balance of everything, it was worth the time on earth and should continue but at a much higher level, singing praises and dancing away the earthly overloads.

But I have to ease out of heavenly dreams with a biblical phenomenon, if real, that has also refused to go away. It is the locust; an organism of scientific origin but crowded in Biblical mystery, nevertheless that periodically shows up as if to demonstrate its powers and remind all and sundry, that it is part of ecological life on earth.

The Desert Locust, (some people call it desert locusts-see the difference?), invaded Uganda in the depth of the COVID-19 Pandemic. The Invasion was as if to remind us, that even the powerful Pharaoh of Egypt had to accept the divine order to “let my people go”. The most prominent and challenging of locust species, entered Uganda in massive numbers two years ago.

Locusts, like they drew the attention of the Pharaoh; here in Uganda, our own President got deeply involved in wanting to know the plans the Ministry of Agriculture and others had to manage the invasion. He thereafter personally got involved in putting together a strategic plan to stop the locust invaders. 

Being a military man by decades of experience, disposition and studious in understanding application of technology in confronting enemies of the State, President Museveni convened meetings at State House and scaled down responsibilities to various ministries coordinated by the Prime Minister.

I was party to these high levels of planning and thereafter at daily briefings at the Office of the Prime Minister. Participants at these briefings included the Minister of Disaster Preparedness, the Food and Agriculture Organisation of United Nations, etc.

In the field of operations, the President allowed deployment of the army to confront the locust invasion, military style. I found his involvement and intervention exciting and I understood it as a new innovation in locust management.

Yours faithfully had, before this time, been involved in locust swarm control in Tanzania, Namibia, Botswana and in armed conflict zones in Angola and Mozambique.  In here, despite the dangers of being shot down by rebels, we deployed spray and survey aircraft that included helicopters, logistical delivery motor vehicles and pesticide loaded spray aircraft. It easily mirrored a military operation, except the staff that I led was civilian.

I should, of course, mention that we had Two-Way radio sets and Fax technology, the later having just been launched.

I was amazed how President Museveni easily understood the deep scientific nature of locust control operations.  The deployment of the military easily helped Uganda manage and stop, in their tracks, the numerous locust swarms that were entering Karamoja from Kenya, having originated from as far as Yemen, Ethiopia and Somalia, all conflict areas that make locust multiplication easily facilitated.

The year, 2022 was a year of celebrating sixty years of existence of the intergovernmental Organisation that is mandated to manage the biblical locust in eastern Africa. It is the Desert Locust Control Organisation for Eastern Africa.

It draws member states of Uganda, Kenya, Tanzania, Ethiopia (Organisation Headquarters), Somalia, Sudan, Eritrea and latest South Sudan.  President Museveni accepted the Ministers’ recommendation that Locust management under DLCO-EA reaches the Heads of State, to receive the necessary attention at the highest level of state decision-making.  Pharaonic attention!

Brazil; Oh Brazil. This is the country that holds the biggest population of blacks in the world. It is the country with the most famous and acclaimed soccer wizard, a black man, Edison Arantes do Nascimento, best known as Pele. Named by his father after inventor Thomas Edison, Pele died and was buried as if to close the year.

He had set foot on Ugandan soil and he met the future “King of Scotland”; Field Marshal Idi Amin Dada. If his visit was today, Ugandans would park the Entebbe-Kampala Expressway in hundreds of thousands and we would henceforth name the hitherto most expensive Road in the Country after him. That might appease many skeptical Ugandans.

Dr J Bahana worked on locust research and control for close to twenty years.