It’s 6:23 a.m. I rush out of my house, a single room whose door is one with a window, a common architectural design for most rentals in the city suburbs. The dust rises above the loose-surface road as motorcycles whisk along the “kafunda”—narrowed paths in congested city suburbs—that connects to the dented tarmac road through Kawaala, my locality. It’s another day in this seemingly unending but laborious hassle to make a living.
It is the norm to be spotted in the distance by a matatu conductor, who thereby bellows “ogenda bulaaza” to mean “Are you going along, brother? I shrug in elitist disgust. But a man must bear the mayhem of the morning rush hour in this busy and rowdy town where everything must be earned at extra cost. Even a seat in these fourteen-seaters must be earned, if not by hearkening to the call of these hard-faced conductors; then through jostling with multitudes in this twilight of the day.

As we drive from Kasubi town centre to Kampala city centre, the crimson light of the sun in the distance graces the everlasting hills of the Kampala skyline, which is dented with a few high-rise buildings now cropping up. I wonder if it is due to an economic boom or luck. The roads are smooth because it takes no longer than 15 minutes to reach Watoto Junction. But it wasn’t always like this, and in most suburbs, it isn’t.

“60 years after independence, what happened?” I ask myself. As the scourge of “black tax”, rent, “pay-as-you-earn” tax (a tax levied on gross earnings by the government), and the misinformed hopes of a soft landing promised to those who achieve academic excellence ravage my poor soul, I remember the staunch lines of scripture I had read in the previous nights. I had been perusing through the book of the Prophet Jeremiah, a man referred to as the weeping prophet. Here, like Jeremiah, I had my own questions.

Jeremiah 2
¹⁴ “Is Israel a servant? Is he a homeborn slave? Why is he plundered?

The scripture had caused me untold anguish. Why would Israel, the firstborn of the Lord, according to Exodus 4:22 be plundered? And here, like Jeremiah, I had beheld the ungodly patterns in our land. It is said that when the righteous rule, the people rejoice (Proverbs 29:2). In the not-so-distant past, we had had a godly ruler of the city, and many things had started to work. One could bank on their taxi making it in time from Kasubi, my locality, to Kampala City Square, for example. But nowadays many things made for weeping—”famine, the sword, and pestilence”—were in the land for anyone who cared to look around. After the “righteous leader”, for fear of their lives, had thrown in the towel, our sun had seemingly fallen out of the sky. There was no longer a predictable aura of progress, but one of survival and grasping for the little available.

If scripture is true, a land is exalted by righteousness, according to Proverbs 14:34. And as for me, I had believed scripture and the Lord Jesus, the Word of God made flesh. And the scripture has shown us the way to prosper. But much was not aligned in our situation. I couldn’t help but ask myself, like the Prophet Jeremiah had done in Jeremiah 14:19. Had the Lord utterly rejected us? Was it because we are the sons of Cush, who is the son of Ham, the cursed son of Noah (Genesis 9:21-27)? Had the Lord utterly saved us? Was he really impoverished so that we might be rich? Did I misunderstand the scripture? To tell the truth, I know that the Word of God is infallible, and perhaps it is me who has skewed my way.

Jeremiah speaks much about the wayward tendency of his people. The abandonment of the commandments and instructions of God to follow idols and become the masters of their own calamities Had we refused the instructions of the Lord? Did we become wise in our own ways? As it is usually said in town, the clever people are those with unjust weights, and care must be taken in any dealings when one goes downtown, lest the “illuminated ones” have a field day.

I know that the Lord is good, and there is no charge I can bring against him. Even then, which court could I ever take my case against the Lord? Maybe we veered off the path of peace and righteousness. Perhaps we mistreated the orphan, widow, and stranger in our midst. Otherwise, why are our daughters taken like merchandise without any honour? Why have the young men gone to the grave in the glory of their strength? There was always hope in our childhood. Education was the key. But as the heckling has become during university times, was the lock changed?

But there is a scripture. It speaks of a hope that does not make one ashamed (Romans 5:5). For the Lord shall surely remember his habitation, the people called by his name. This He has given to us by the sacrifice of Jesus on the cross: that we take up a place in the Church of the Firstborn (Hebrews 12:23). For we shall declare his generation (Isaiah 53:8), because our prayer is now accepted in Zion (Isaiah 18:7). The Lord of Hosts shall raise us as a people, for now we go to the mountain of the House of the Lord, and of His ways shall we be taught. This desolation that walks in the land shall pass away, and the Lord will return like the Shulamite bride (Song of Solomon 6:13) and prosper his people. Even streams shall flow instead of the corruption of sewage in the city.

Because I believe in the testimony of scripture, the utterance of Isaiah 2:3–4 is sure comfort. Things will not always be the same. Men shall not always sell their inheritance to strangers. In the day when the Lord shall remember us, these strange men will feed our flocks. The peace of the Lord—that divine peace that surpasses all understanding—shall stay in our midst and cause mourning to pass away.

It is 7:04 am as I log into my workstation to commence another day of paying my dues to the economy of the country. I read Lamentations 3:24 (NLT) with a sigh of hope:

Lamentations 3
²⁴ I say to myself, “The Lord is my inheritance; therefore, I will hope in him!”

Shalom.