Akii-Bua, Uganda's legendary athlete

To mark 50 years of Uganda’s independence, New Vision will until October 9, 2012 be publishing highlights of events and profi ling personalities that have shaped the history of this country. Today, NORMAN KATENDE looks at the outstanding contribution of Akii-Bua, the first Ugandan athlete to win a gold medal in Olympics


Not until the Kony 2012 film, basically two questions were asked if you identified yourself as a Ugandan: either about Idi Amin, for most of the people; or John Akii-Bua from sports lovers.

The latter became a household name when he won an Olympic gold medal in Munich in 1972.

His early life in Kampala

Akii-Bua’s early life started in1964 after the death of his father, Rwot Bua, and his migration to Kampala.

As one of 42 children, Akii-Bua wanted to have a good life but saw no future in Abako village, Lango district. When he arrived in Kampala, his strategy was to get a job in the Police force.

Luck was on his side and indeed Akii-Bua joined the Police Football C and later the Police Force. His speed saw him recruited to the athletics team.

His gateway to sports

Akii-Bua started his career as a jumper and sprinter. He later became a hurdler after Malcolm Arnold, his coach, realised his potential.

Like most sportsmen of the time, Akii-Bua used to have extra training in the evenings at the current Kyambogo University grounds. “I would call him either hardworking or selfish.

We were younger boys by then and he used to call us to help him carry hurdles at around 7:00pm when most of the athletes had retired,” says Francis Demayi, now an athletics coach. It is this hard work that made him shine.

His training package included wearing a vest weighing close to 10kg and he would run 1,500 meters over five hurdles that were 42 inches high. He trained twice daily.

Taking on the world

Akii-Bua launched his international career at the Commonwealth games in Edinburgh in 1970, but was unlucky not to win a medal because he finished fourth. However, he took this as a learning point.

He increased his workouts and, with no international event on the calendar, managed to run the fastest season time in 1971, a sign that he would compete for the top honours at the Olympic Games in 1972.

Indeed in 1972, he went ahead to beat Britain’s Dave Hemery, the world record-holder and defending Olympic champion, and American Ralph Mann.

This was despite running in a two-year-old pair of shoes, with one missing a spike. “In Germany, everybody was talking about our own national athletes. We had a number of favourites in various disciplines like Heide Rosendahl (long jump) and Ulrike Meyfarth (high jump) who managed to win gold in their competitions.

With the exception of a few better informed experts maybe, nobody expected a sensational performance involving an African athlete on his mind,” says the German Ambassador to Uganda, Klaus Dieter Duxmann, who was a child at that time.

“None of us had ever heard of Akii-Bua who had been chosen to run on the little-liked inner lane. So everybody focused on the favourites like David Hemery (UK) and our own German athlete.

When the group of runners were about to finish the final curve, to everybody’s surprise, Akii-Bua was at par with the favourites and with each passing meter increased his lead. The audience got increasingly excited and finally celebrated Akii-Bua as if he was one of their own.”

Introducing the victory lap

Akii Bua was so overwhelmed with joy for winning that when he was given the Uganda flag to celebrate, he ran around the stadium waving the flag as he received a standing ovation.

Little did he know he was starting a new trend in sports and since then, athletes have had what has come to be christened a victory lap in almost all international events.

Akii-Bua never had a chance to defend his title during the Montreal 1976 Olympic Games as African countries boycotted the games. He tried to make a comeback in the 1980 Moscow Olympic Games, but did not go beyond the semi-finals.

His life during Idi Amin’s regime

With the publicity he got for winning a gold medal, Akii-Bua became a hero and enjoyed a good relationship with government officials. However, being a Langi, the tribe of the former president Milton Obote, Akii-Bua did not find much favour with the then president Idi Amin.

“If I had not won that gold medal, perhaps I would have left Uganda. But I won the highest honour in track for my country, so I could not leave. Uganda was, in effect, a prison. I guess Amin wanted to put me in jail several times, but he did not because I was a prominent person,” he wrote in his diary in 1978.

In the later years of Amin’s reign, his movements were restricted; he stayed at home. He fled to exile in Kenya with his cousin in 1979 at the climax of the war to topple Amin.

Outside Uganda

In Kenya, he was imprisoned for a month before being put in a refugee camp, where he lived a destitute. It was only after the media published a story about how the Olympic medalist was suffering that he got help.

“I am a runner. I cannot tell you how bad it is here,” is the famous quote that caught the attention of the world and saw Puma, his shoe manufacturer, inviting him to work in Germany. He stayed in Germany for about four years, before returning home due to homesickness.

His life in Uganda

Back home, life was not as luxurious as he expected; his house had been destroyed, his biggest treasure, the Olympic medal looted, and five of his brothers and a sister killed.

Even the house on Block 29, Kibuga County, Plot 613 in Kamwokya that Amin built in recognition of his victory in 1972 came under threats of being taken over until the finance ministry and the justice ministry paid off its mailo interest, says Tony Bua, his son and heir.

“Technically, it is not a family property yet,” he says. “It will only be when we get a land title.” His tried to do a number of things, including coaching athletes, but he was no longer the active Akii.

Failing to settle in, his life became more boring and frustration took its toll. “I wanted to coach an athlete who would be the best in the world,” he said in one of his diaries. His dream, however, had never materialised by the time he passed on in June 1997.