Ssekiwunga gets new breath of life as they break ground for new Church

The place Ssekiwunga in Busiro sounds as if it is located deeply in the villages yet it is just 12 miles from Kampala Capital City off Entebbe Road at the outskirts of Akright City and just a kilometer away from the Entebbe Express High way.

For sure this place used to be one of the remotest villages along Entebbe Road, thank God, with the coming into place of the Akright City Kakungulu, this place has got a new breath of life. A small but neat Anglican Church named St. Marks Church Ssekiwunga used to be located here in a very isolated place. It was actually in the midst of the bush with no nearby houses apart from a small brick house adjacent to the Church where the Lay Reader used to reside.

It used to be every Lay Reader’s nightmare to be posted to this place. One would think twice before accepting to be posted to such a place. First and foremost, there were a handful of Christians in this area. Secondly, a typical Sunday service would attract not more than five people. This meant that at the end of the month, the Lay Reader would never think of every getting his/her monthly payment in full.

All that is now history, ever since Herbert Muhumuza, mobilized his fellow Akright residents to start worshipping at this place, the place has changed for better. For now the place has changed, they have a state of the art master plan for the whole place and they have given themselves one year to complete a 700 seater church complex with a modern primary school and other developments on the 10 acres of land in this part of the Akright City.

On Friday 17th August 2018, the Bishop of Namirembe Diocese the Rt. Rev. Wilberforce Kityo Luwalira was hosted to this area to break the ground for the construction of the new Church.
In his sermon, Bishop Luwalira said that if the work survives on the foundation, each one will be rewarded. He said that he had seen the people of Ssekiwunga with all the guts of completing the construction in one year. He said that he had the faith that God the Master planner was going to put in place the plan and was going to accomplish it. He thanked the people of this area for knowing the signs of the season and also getting to know what they are supposed to do.

The Bishop said that God had called all of them to build a new Church building and he was sure the congregation would do like God had called them to do so. “None of us is called to be a spectator. We are all called to serve” he said amidst clapping and ululations.
He went on to say that God had called us to be faithful since faithfulness is one of the greatest attributes of our God. He further said that when God begins a good work, He will definitely accomplish it.
“God is the master planner, the master builder and has good plans for us” he said. He then asked the people of Ssekiwunga to consult God for the best plan, consult God for the resources and that God had called them to do monitoring, evaluation and supervision.
The Bishop also said that when people get to know Jesus, He also opens their wallets and they start contributing generously. He warned them that in Uganda today, people have become so much obsessed with love for “enjawulo”  “omuntu omuwa omulimu natandikirawo okukubaza” meaning that nowdays you give someone a job and he starts forging the way he can cheat you.
He later on broke the ground at the place where the construction of the Church is going to take place.
On his part, the Assistant Archdeacon of Entebbe Archdeaconry, Rev. Emmanuel Kenneth Ssewanyana thanked the people of Ssekiwunga for the speed at which they were carrying out construction in the area. He said that he had hope that the Church won’t take long to be accomplished.

On her part, the Government Chief Whip Hon. Ruth Nankabirwa thanked the bishop for sparing time to come and break the ground. She said that as Christians of Ssekiwunga, they were requesting for a very good Anglican primary school in the area which one of them would run on behalf of the Church to ensure that the church is sustainable. She contributed 100 bags of cement which will be delivered the following day.

The Head of Laity Mrs. Margaret Kawumi elaborated how this work would be accomplished in phases of 52 days each from the foundation, construction of walls, Roofing and furnishing the Church.
The MC of the day Alex Kamukama who is also the head of planning and development, spiced the function with the way he narrated how all this had been done.
The outgoing Head of Laity and also Chairman of LC, Tom Tenyigwa gave a history of how that Church was started in 1966 up to the present day.

I am running for my mother. #RotaryCancerRun2018

I am running for my Mother

By Hannington Sebuliba

In June, 2001 my mother Jane Christine Sebuliba  went to Masaka Hospital for a tooth extraction. After the tooth had been extracted, she started feeling throbbing pain in the wound and thought it would go away as time went by. This was not so as the pain continued for next few weeks. She later on went back for a checkup and was thinking that may be part of the tooth had been left in. The doctor found out that it had not been left in but the wound was taking longer to heal.

She started taking pain killers that would bring some relief to her but as soon as the effect of the pain killers had stopped, the pain would start all over again.  This was the pain she had to endure for close to a year. It was after sometime in May 2002 that she went to Byansi Medical Centre in Masaka and the doctors found out that the pain was becoming cancerous but, they referred her to Mulago Hospital for further management.

My late brother Kyewalabye Robert who was working with the Education department in Masaka District brought her to Mulago in June 2002 but the lines were so long that they couldn’t see the doctor that very day. He then called me and informed me about the whole story and that mummy was going to spend the night with us and that I would take her very early in the morning because the appointment was for 8:00am.

The following morning, we left home at 6:00am and boarded a taxi up to Mulago hospital. We went to the Oral/dental department and met Dr. Kamulegeya who checked maama and decided that we should have a biopsy to rule out or confirm the possibility of cancer. Mum could not afford to go for biopsy, she just told me that she would go back home and continue with the medicines she was taking. I pleaded to her but she couldn’t accept. This was after we had seen a number of people suffering from different forms of cancer. She said that at least for her, she was better than many of the people we had found both at the Cancer institute and at the Dental Department.
After she had gone back to Masaka, I talked to my boss Prof. Henry Kasozi, the Medical Director of Kadic Hospital in Bukoto where I was working as PR/Marketing Manager. He told me to bring maama to Kadic so that he talks to her and you never know she would accept to have biopsy carried out.  It took us another four month to convince her to come back to Kampala.

God was on our side, in that she accepted Professor Kasozi’s counsel together with the late Dr. Nkurukenda who carried out the biopsy and then confirmed that she had developed cancer of the toungue. It became very difficult for us to accept the outcomes and even breaking the news to mummy was very difficult. Everybody feared to break the news and they told me that since I was working in the hospital, I would be the one to break the news. I prayed to God for guidance and lucky enough when I told her, she accepted the news and said that all along she had believed that it was cancer. By this time she was not eating but only drinking and cancer had gone up to the throat.

This gave us a better way to start on the medication as we had been referred to Mulago Radiotherapy department  where she would undergo radiotherapy treatment  twice a week. I want to thank very much Dr. Kiguli, who welcomed us with two hands as I had been sent to him by both his friends Prof. Kasozi and Dr. Nkurukenda. My mother, my sister Sarah who was nursing her and I, would be given preferential treatment at Mulago for a whole year we had to seek treatment at the Radiotherapy machine. I must say that I was a bit lucky because Kadic Hospital surrendered one of their ambulances to help me take mum every time she needed treatment at Mulago.
On top of the radiotherapy sessions at Mulago, Hospice Africa located at Makindye, helped to offer her counseling and palliative treatment which included oral morphine that would bring a lot of relief to mum.

For close to a year and a half, while undergoing treatment, mum could not eat since the whole tongue had been affected by cancer and the throat too was being affected. Doctors had wanted to feed her through a tube but she refused it and would just use a straw to feed on milk and soup.
It was at this time that I came to know that cancer was a very dangerous disease because I would see that my mum had lost hope of living beyond her 60th birthday. She kept on telling us how that disease was more painful than labour pains and that she was looking forward to a day when God would call her home.

On Sunday 15th February 2004, she called all of us to go home and she told us whatever she had wanted us to know. All of us arrived home early and when she came out of her bedroom she, fell down in the corridor and said “eh! Ekigwo kino kitegeeza ki?” she asked literary translated as “eh! What does this falling mean?”  we all just laughed it off. She then sat in the sitting room and told us whatever she had wanted to tell us. She concluded by saying that she was too hungry and had accepted to be taken to Kitovu Hospital so that they fix a feeding tube in her throat. She told me to go to Church and thank the congregation for whatever they had done for her, which I did.

After lunch, we all parted ways and she was taken to Kitovu Hospital, but at 7:35pm, she breathed her last. And that’s how cancer consumed my lovely mum. Therefore, this year, I am running for my mother and the many people who are suffering from the deadly cancer. No more people should suffer from Cancer.
When Rotary Started these Cancer Runs, I vowed to always run so that so many people out there who are suffering from cancer are assisted. I will continue to run until I will run no more.