Victoria has an African name

Mar 11, 2009

EDITOR—I agree with Bosire Mosi’s letter published on March 6. His argument of Africans being brainwashed and believing in European names is valid. I however, disagree with his suggestion about renaming Lake Victoria after Nelson Mandela.

EDITOR—I agree with Bosire Mosi’s letter published on March 6. His argument of Africans being brainwashed and believing in European names is valid. I however, disagree with his suggestion about renaming Lake Victoria after Nelson Mandela.

While I have great respect for Mandela, we should also recognise that we as other Africans had our local names. Lake Victoria had a local name before the advent of Europeans. Occasionally the names our ancestors gave to the places around them revolved around their lives and culture. Lake Victoria was called Nalubale in Lusoga. Lubale means ‘god’.

Adding the ‘Na’ means ‘most powerful’. Nalubale therefore meant god the most powerful or almighty. The massive water body was their only known god as Christianity and other religions were introduced to the region much later. Similarly, River Nile was called ‘Kiyira’. It means the ‘the river that roars’ and River Nile roars as it starts its journey at Budhagali.

Budhagali was the medium between the people and their god through whom they could communicate. There is no need to change Lake Victoria’s name from a European to a South African one when it already had a Lusoga name.

Flavia Nakumugonza
Kampala

(adsbygoogle = window.adsbygoogle || []).push({});