This is the creation of Sir Andrew Cohen's ingenious and liberal mind, and this proposal for the new Legislative Council was as far as he wished to go and received my approval at the time he put the proposals forward. I thought it as well to correct the hon. Gentleman on these rather vital points, on which he was so much astray.
Under the new Constitution which is to be introduced early next year, there are to be three Baganda members, and the intention was that as in the past the Kabaka should put forward names for the approval of the Governor.
He made clear that far from nominating members, he would actively oppose the appointment even directly by the Governor, of any Baganda members at all. Thus Uganda would have been left without representation, and when matters vitally affecting the interests and well-being of the people of Buganda were being discussed in the Legislative Council, they themselves would have been left without the means of voicing their opinions or their desires.
This was a serious, indeed it was a critical matter for the Baganda but, when I turn, as I must, to the demands that Buganda should be made an independent State—a demand which the Kabaka has not withdrawn, but has continually repeated—the House will see that the whole future of the Protectorate of Uganda is involved. I would go further and say that the whole future of Uganda is manaced. It is necessary for me at this point to touch quite a bit on the background against which I say this.
The Western Province includes three native States with separate, but similar agreements, referred to generally as Agreement States. Buganda is also a native State, but is much the largest in the country.
It comprises about 17, square miles out of the 80, which is the area of Uganda and it has over 1,, inhabitants. Regarding the relationship between the Baganda and the Protectorate as a whole, Article 3 of the Agreement of recites this: The Kingdom of Buganda in the administration of the Uganda Protectorate shall rank as a province of equal rank with any other provinces into which the Protectorate may be divided.
Clearly, it was the intention from the very beginning that Buganda should be an integral part of the Protectorate. Indeed, as recently as March this year the Kabaka publicly joined with the Governor in stating—and I quote: The Kingdom of Uganda will continue to go forward under the government of His Highness the Kabaka and play its part, in accordance with Article 3 of the Agreement, as a province and a component part of the Protectorate.
Thus, for more than 50 years, Buganda has been administered as a unitary State and, as everyone here knows, it has shown steady progress. That progress has been greatly accelerated in recent years and the progress applies equally to social, economic and political matters. All the efforts of the British Administration have been to make Uganda grow into a prosperous State with advancing political institutions.
I must mention these things, because they are the things that are threatened by the present crisis. On the political side, I need only refer to the enlargement of the Legislative Council, the development of local government, and the plan to hand over to the Buganda Government responsibility for certain important services. These are proposals for which Sir Andrew Cohen has been responsible, and which I have approved. On the economic side—and the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Llanelly Mr.
Griffiths , in many of these matters, has played a worthy part—there have been great advances. Eight ginneries have been made available to the African co-operatives to gin their cotton. The Government are engaged in reorganising the coffee industry to give Africans an opportunity to play a part in the processing of their own crops.
I am sure that it is not necessary to dwell very long upon the disastrous effect of trying to split up what is already a small enough country into smaller pieces. Buganda lies athwart the main lines of communication from the west to the east coast of Africa, which run up the Congo and the great lakes, through Buganda, and down to Mombasa.
Every season there is large-scale migration of workers from the Congo to Kampala and the industries of the Eastern Province. I need not emphasise its key position athwart the communications. Further, the Owen Falls power station lies astride the Victoria Nile, one end of the dam is in the Eastern Province and the other end of the dam and the power station are in Buganda.
The commercial capital of Uganda is at Kampala, which is in Buganda. The political capital and the airfield are at Entebbe, also in the Province of Buganda. Both have grown up in the belief that Buganda would remain the geographical centre of the country and an integral part of the Protectorate. Kampala's commerce has close ties with Jinja in the Eastern Province, which is the chief port on Lake Victoria. I apologise for developing what I know most hon. Mem- bers are familiar with, but, in short, the prosperity and expanding national life which I predict, and for which we should all work, would receive a fatal blow if Uganda were split up into more than one State.
Here is the crux of the whole matter. Could the Kabaka be allowed to state publicly that he intended to separate from the rest of Uganda? It was on this point chiefly that the discussions, with which I have been kept constantly in touch, took place between the Governor and the Kabaka. I want to go into some of the circumstances in order to rebut any ideas that hon.
Members may be harbouring that these matters were hastily discussed and dismissed summarily. As soon as I heard about this crisis I wondered whether I should fly out to Buganda, and I think the House would acquit me of any unwillingness to fly out to the scene of trouble, but I reflected very deeply whether I should use that particular method on this occasion.
The Governor was very much against it, and I agreed with him. I reluctantly abandoned it. The reasons seemed to me then and still seem to me valid.
They were that it would greatly increase the local tension if the Secretary of State went out and was known to be engaged in this kind of discussion. I therefore abandoned this course, though with some reluctance, but I know that that decision was right. Then it occurred to me to consider whether it would be suitable to ask the Kabaka to fly here and have discussions with me. I wish to explain now why I rejected that alternative. If I had been successful in persuading the Kabaka to work with Her Majesty's Government and not against them, then, of course, all would have been well and the Kabaka could have returned and the tension would have rapidly disappeared.
But supposing I had not been successful, what then? The Governor advised that in that event it was out of the question for the Kabaka, having openly set himself in opposition to Her Majesty's Government, to return to the territory without the gravest fears of civil disturbance.
The unanimous view of the Governor and all his advisers was that in that event we should risk a serious upheaval. In other words, if the Kabaka had not agreed I should have had to inform him in this country that he could not return to Uganda.
I considered that this would not be treating him fairly and that I must either give him a guarantee that he should return to Buganda, or that I should not ask him here. I thought that that was right.
In short, I decided that the negotiations with the Kabaka must take place in Uganda, and must be conducted by the Governor. It is unnecessary for me to tell hon. Members that in Sir Andrew Cohen who, when I first took office, was Head of the African Division of the Colonial Office and the Governor-designate of Uganda, we have a man with a long record of fruitful and enlightened work for Africans, a man of wide and liberal views and of outstanding ability and intellectual force.
I reached the conclusion that if anyone was likely to persuade the Kabaka, it would be the Governor. Moreover, it was known to me that on some other occasions, before I took office, when the Kabaka was in minor disagreement with the Colonial Office, Sir Andrew Cohen had acted in the most friendly manner to the Kabaka, and had conducted the negotiations with marked success.
I think that this disposes of the suggestion that these negotiations were quickly and brusquely dealt with. Nothing could be further from the truth. The Governor had six long interviews with the Kabaka. He first saw him on 27th October, then on 29th October, again on 3rd November, again on 6th November, again on 27th November, and for the sixth time on 30th November.
I became increasingly concerned at the obdurate nature of the Kabaka's opposition, which had persisted and, indeed, had become more pronounced during these five weeks of discussion, and before his meeting on Friday last I sent an urgent telegram to the Governor.
In that telegram I told the Governor that—and these are the actual words—as "a high matter of policy" the Kabaka should be persuaded to comply with his obligations under the Agreement and that he should be persuaded not to withdraw from the very clear position that he had taken up in March.
I said, in that telegram, that I relied upon the Governor to use once more his very best endeavours to persuade the Kabaka to respond to my appeal.
He should then allow a period of two or three days to elapse, and it was only then, if the Kabaka persisted in his refusal, this extreme step should be taken. Before he set in motion the machinery for the final act he told the Kabaka specifically that his persistence in his attitude would involve a breach of the Agreement and would entitle Her Majesty's Government to withdraw recognition.
The Governor asked the Kabaka whether he understood this and he replied that he did. All our efforts to persuade the Kabaka failed, but I can tell the House with absolute sincerity that nothing was left undone which might have induced the Kabaka to repent of the errors of his ways and take his proper part in the development, both of his own territory and its inhabitants, and of Uganda as a whole.
It remains for me to inform the House, briefly, of events since the Kabaka left Uganda. Yesterday, the Katikiro—that is the Prime Minister of Buganda—broadcast to the people of Buganda and called upon them to remain calm. This, according to my reports, they have done and the Governor has told me that he does not expect any trouble at the present time.
The Katikiro also informed them that the meeting of the Lukiko would be held today. I have not received a telegraphic report of that meeting, but I understand from the Governor—whom I telephoned about half-past one this afternoon—that the Lukiko wished to send a delegation to meet me in London. I will be ready to see them. This morning I had a long talk with the Kabaka. I did not wish to press him into further discussion of political matters beyond what he wished to say himself.
He was alone, and he feels severely the loss of his sister, which I am sure the whole House deplores. This conversation could not have been more friendly. It was extremely painful to me because of the dignified and correct bearing of the Kabaka in all these matters.
It was the more painful to me because he was a member of my university and of my regiment, and a friend of my son's at Cambridge. I was able to assure him that no personal matters arose at all, but that I had a clear duty in these matters which, however painful, I must fulfil.
In that conversation it was made clear to me that the Kabaka fully understood the nature of the two issues upon which this action had had to be taken and that no compromise compatible with my duties was possible. It remains my unshakeable belief that the people of Buganda and the other peoples of the provinces of the Protectorate could not achieve that political, social and economic progress to which they aspire and for which the Governor has done such notable work unless the unity of the Protectorate was maintained, preserved and proclaimed at this moment.
Unfortunately, the proposals of the Kabaka were in direct contradiction to that aim. He wishes to divide Buganda. In the past, it has sometimes been a jibe against the British, as against the Roman Empire, that their motto was "Divide and rule. I conclude by saying once more that the personal aspect of this affair is particularly painful. The action which was taken has not been taken with any haste. In fact, it has been delayed until every opportunity had been given to the Kabaka to revise and reverse his decision.
We have, I believe, acted rightly and we have certainly been moved by one guiding principle, that of our desire to secure the continued advancement of all the peoples of the Protectorate, including, not least, the people of Buganda itself. In spite of the statement which has just been made by the Colonial Secretary, we are still very much in the dark as to exactly what is the situation in Uganda at present. The Secretary of State has given us certain immediate facts leading up to the present situation, but he has given us no picture of the background of the situation as it exists in Uganda, if indeed it is the case that this is anything more than a current difficulty that has arisen between the colonial administration in this country and the Kabaka.
I know very well that in Uganda there has always been a very widely held point of view in very responsible circles in that country rather contrary to the view indicated by the Secretary of State today of the purpose expressed by the Kabaka on this occasion of re-establishing the hereditary rule of the Buganda Kabaka over the whole combined Territory. That, as far as my experience goes, has been the main demand among the Baganda tribe—not the separation of Buganda from Uganda—but, on the contrary, the unity of Uganda under Buganda with its old hereditary chiefs.
I do not know whether it means that there is in Uganda at present a very strong section of opinion which would not be in favour of the attitude taken up by the Kabaka.
It has not been illustrated how far the Kabaka has the support of any element in his kingdom for the attitude which the Secretary of State assured us has been taken so rigidly by the Kabaka during the negotiations. All we can be concerned about at present is the immediate action that has been taken and how far that action can be justified in the context of the rather sketchy picture as we have seen it.
On this side of the House, and I think widely throughout the country, there is very grave concern. We fear that this is merely another incident in the tragic history of the present administration of the Colonial Secretary, particularly in Africa.
I remember clearly in , when the present Government were elected, the reception that that event obtained in the African native Press. I remember headlines which said, "Goodbye to colonial freedom. They may have been right or wrong, but at least that is indicative of the kind of feeling which was already alive in Africa at the beginning of the present Administration. Since then we have had the Central African situation, we have had the Seretse Khama issue, we have had the British Guiana situation, and we have had the complete mishandling of the situation in Kenya.
Even though the Secretary of State has assured us that the Kabaka, and the Lukiko presumably, are now prepared to accept the assurances he has given them in regard to the intention of the present Government with reference to an East African federation which would embrace Buganda as well as the other three Territories, whatever they may have said about acceptance of those assurances they may well have been uneasy in their minds—to put it mildly—before they got the assurances, and they may be a little uneasy now.
Certainly, before that, the natural reaction in any Territory in Africa to the merest whisper of the possibility of a new enforced administration, after the Central African developments, would be the creation of great unrest among the people of such a Territory.
Therefore, I wonder whether the Colonial Secretary, even if he tried on this occasion to act differently from what he has done on other occasions, with all the sincerity that he protested about over and over again in his statement of a few minutes ago, and the way he endeavoured to reassure the Kabaka, has been successful in reassuring all the elements which have been disturbed by the unnecessary and harmful talk in which he engaged at the notorious dinner and which carried the implication that the Africans took.
Gentleman told us that he had left nothing undone and that everything had been done, before he took the final, serious step, in trying to reconcile the Kabaka. He has already told us that everything was left to discussion between the Governor and the Kabaka in Uganda.
He told us that he had considered the possibility of flying over to Uganda in order to discuss the very serious situation with the Kabaka, but he dismissed that, for quite understandable reasons. Then the right hon. Gentleman considered the alternative of bringing the Kabaka over here but he dismissed that also because he said that if the Kabaka would not change, we should have to tell him that he could not go back to Africa.
I quite understand the position up to that point. Gentleman might surely have considered the possibility of inviting the Kabaka as a final step, in order to impress him by the gesture and by the discussions that he might have with the Colonial Department, away from the atmosphere in which he had been carrying on those discussions hitherto.
If then he still took the same view, surely it would not be beyond the bounds of possibility to allow him to go back to Uganda before taking any further action. I do not think that would have been impossible, in view of the importance and the seriousness of the matter, and it might well not have been considered. I am more concerned about the extent to which the action which has in fact been taken by our Government and by the Colonial Secretary has legal standing.
We had an interesting intervention from the Attorney-General, who was asked whether we had any authority to dethrone or depose, and then to expel, the Kabaka. The Agreement was quoted by the Attorney-General.
Article 6 of the Agreement says that as long as the Kabaka, chiefs and people of Uganda shall conform to the laws and Regulations instituted for their governance by Her Majesty's Government and shall co-operate loyally with Her Majesty's Government in the organisation and administration of the said kingdom of Uganda, Her Majesty's Government agrees to recognise the Kabaka of Uganda as the Native Ruler of the Province of Uganda under Her Majesty's protection and over-rule.
Well, all right; under the agreement we are entitled to withdraw recognition of the Kabaka as ruler of Uganda. That is all right up to that point, but there is no mention of deposing him as King of Buganda or of the right to deport him, and certainly no mention of any right by ourselves as one party to an agreement—which the Colonial Secretary assured us was freely entered into by the two Sovereign authorities, Uganda and ourselves, in —which was freely entered into by the two parties not only to depose but to expel the Kabaka, and above all to take over unilateral control of the other party's territory.
The Agreement says in Article Should the Kabaka, chiefs or people of Uganda pursue at any time a policy which is distinctly disloyal to the British Protectorate, Her Majesty's Government will no longer consider themselves bound by the terms of this agreement. What are the terms of the Agreement? That we shall recognise the Kabaka and, in return for certain privileges which we enjoy under the Agreement, shall extend certain privileges to the Kabaka and his people.
We shall allow him to have a salute of six or nine guns, we shall pay him and his mother a certain salary and shall extend certain other advantages under our protection, and in return we shall have certain rights and privileges.
To say that we are no longer bound by the terms of that Agreement can mean nothing more than that we shall refrain from giving those advantages to the Kabaka and his people as provided in the Agreement, until an alternative arrangement is made. The Agreement in no way provides—and I challenge the Attorney-General to show it—any right on the part of one contracting party when disagreeing with the other not only to withdraw from the Agreement but to take over unilateral control of the other party's territory and to expel the Kabaka.
If the Kabaka had tried to take over our own ruler and expel him from the territory, we might have got a test case. I hope that this point will be answered, because the Secretary of State might be in serious legal difficulties over this action.
I do not want to say much more on this point. The Colonial Secretary has told us, and we welcome the announcement, that the Lukiko has asked for a delegation from it to be received in this country by the Minister and that the right hon.
Gentleman is prepared to receive it. Presumably it will come over, and there will be discussions. I gathered from his statement that he was prepared to discuss earnestly and seriously with it some way of overcoming the difficulties that have occurred in its territory.
I hope that is going to happen. I hope that before the delegation comes the Colonial Secretary will withdraw the statement that he made in the House of Commons on Monday. He went on: I must make it quite clear that this decision is final. I do not see how we can possibly hope for any kind of agreement from it unless the Colonial Secretary is prepared to make a statement in advance that he does not now contend that the decision that has been taken is final and irrevocable.
If that is not done, I should say that the visit of the delegation of the Lukiko to this country is not likely to achieve very much. There is no gesture that would give more reassurance to the delegation when it comes, or to the people of our own country who are interested in this matter, as well as to many millions of people abroad who are probably watching this terrible story of the progress of Tory administration of our Colonial Territories, than a clear statement by the Colonial Secretary that he is prepared to meet this delegation on a fresh basis and to reconsider, as a result of any agreement he may be able to reach with that body, the decision that has already been taken with regard to the deposition of the Kabaka, provided that the Kabaka is prepared to play his part.
I appeal to the Colonial Secretary to make such a statement before the evening is out. There is nothing more that I want to say about this matter because, as I and other hon. Members have said, we have not yet enough information about the real story behind all this to enable us to go deeply into it.
But we are very seriously concerned, not only because of the apparent mishandling of this case, but because this happens to be one more in a long series of what appear to be classic blunders on the part of the Colonial Secretary in the administration of these Territories and elsewhere upon which depends so much the future and the prestige of this country. I am sure that the House will join with me in regretting that the hon. Member for Attercliffe Mr. Hynd devoted such a large part of his speech to an attack upon my right hon.
Friend the Colonial Secretary. I felt, after the speech made by my right hon. Friend, that that aspect of this debate seemed wrong and quite out of tune with the mood of the House as a whole. I do not think that I am called upon to comment upon the criticisms made by the hon. Gentleman, but I think it fair to say that in Colonial Territories all over the world there are men who are called upon to carry the burden of administration, to do the dull routine work of trying to ensure that these Territories move forward to better things, and who know that there is at the Colonial Office a man who will not sacrifice them on the altar of political expediency or on the lesser shrine of his own political reputation.
There is no man who knows that better, or who is more grateful for the fact today than the Governor of Uganda, Sir Andrew Cohen. The origins of the present trouble in Buganda are laid at the door of my right hon. Friend because of a casual allusion by him at a dinner in London to a closer union with East Africa. I was surprised to find myself recognising some of the phraseology used by my right hon.
Friend on that occasion. It was taken direct from one of the essays in a book published by the Fabian Society in , in which it is said that the era of the small, isolated independent States is over.
I am only sorry that my right hon. Friend did not at the same time make reference to the origin of his remarks. It is quite clear that it has been the policy of the Socialist Government, as it has been of the present Government, to try to ensure co-operation between States which are not themselves economically or politically viable.
That, after all, is the whole principle behind our approach to the problem of Nigeria and to that of the West Indies. I think it fair to remark that in a very interesting leading article, the "Manchester Guardian" pointed out these two major successes for the colonial policy of the present Government. If that is true of a bigger political unit, then surely it is equally true of a smaller unit such as the Protectorate of Buganda, with which we are dealing at the present time. I cannot think that the statement made by my right hon.
Friend at that dinner departed from the general line of policy which has been worked out through the High Commission, and which Lord Faringdon held out during the controversy over federation as the right, proper and tactful way of ensuring the advantages of closer union without incorporating any of the features which he objected to in Central Africa.
Therefore, there is not only a prima facie case for not accepting the allegation that this incident arises from the speech made by my right hon. Friend, but, also, that there is other evidence as well which appears in a statement made by the Governor immediately after the deposing of the Kabaka. In his statement, Sir Andrew Cohen says: Finally, in his message to the Baganda people the Governor has expressed his deep distress at the grave action which the Kabaka's attitude has made unavoidable.
He has referred to the special efforts which he had made from the first moment he arrived in the Protectorate to be on terms of friendship with the Kabaka, who, however, did not give the Governor his confidence.
It is clear from that statement that, as far as the Governor is concerned, this problem of the relations between Her Majesty's Government in the Protectorate and the Kabaka's Government is one of long standing, going back for perhaps two full years. Let me try to outline what I think is the background to this. It is quite clear that Sir Andrew Cohen went out to Uganda with the highest hopes, as well he might, for the future of the Protectorate.
He saw the opportunity of experimenting in democratic, progressive forms of government in a Colony in Africa which, on the face of it, would appear to be far better adapted for that form of experiment than any of our Colonies there. He went there having served with the greatest effect and value in the Colonial Office. When he arrived, one thing he clearly came up against straight away was the problem, which every administrator in Uganda has come up against in that Protectorate, the special position claimed by the Baganda nation.
It has been pointed out that the Baganda are, themselves, only roughly one-quarter of the population of the whole of Uganda.
They have, for various reasons been, and have regarded themselves as, superior to the rest of the Protectorate. This is very clearly illustrated in the statement of the Great Lukiko itself. There, it reads: Long before the coming of the European Buganda had achieved an undisputed supremacy over her neighbours.
The monarch"— that is, the Kabaka— was accepted as the supreme ruler by the other tribes surrounding Buganda, and they owed allegiance to him.
Right from the early days of Speke, the Baganda have had a position of superiority in the Protectorate. The position of the feudal families in the Great Lukiko itself has also been weakened.
It has been an inevitable part of the democratisation of the institutions of the tribe and of the Protectorate. For instance, in there were no elected members of the Great Lukiko. After , 36 elected members were included, and that number has steadily risen to the present figure of Further, in the Legislative Assembly it self, the representation of the Baganda has been proportionately reduced. Up to the present, the proportion of Baganda representatives is two out of eight, which is 25 per cent.
After 1st January next year it will be three out 14, which is just over 20 per cent. It is clear, therefore, that the class which ruled the Baganda people for perhaps two or three hundred years, and the Baganda people, themselves, in respect of the other tribes surrounding them in Uganda, are gradually feeling that their grip on the situation is loosening. That has brought out a tribal nationalism, if I may put it that way. That is represented in the unrealistic resolutions of the Great Lukiko.
Nobody who has followed the speech of the Secretary of State can believe that Buganda can remain a little isolated enclave in the middle of Africa and survive.
Surely it is clear that the Baganda people as a whole cannot believe that either. It is completely unrealistic. But it is a natural reaction to the gradual evening up of influence among all the tribes, with such peoples as the Bunyoro and all the rest in the Uganda Protectorate.
What is so curious is that this problem of tribalism is not exclusive to Uganda. Nkrumah, in the Gold Coast, is facing exactly the same problem. There, he has decided that the privileged position which was enjoyed by the Ashanti will no longer continue. It has led almost to a split in his party. It has produced very strong feelings among the Ashanti. He is, therefore, facing the same problem which will be faced in other parts of Africa and which exists in Buganda today.
That is the reversion to the tribal loyalties during a period when events and the whole of present day political influences are moving towards a linking of tribes with tribes, and a general levelling of their respective customs, traditions and power. I feel, approaching the problem from that point of view, that it is absolutely clear that the Secretary of State could have taken no other decision in the circumstances than the one he has taken. I believe that it is in the interests not only of the Baganda people themselves, but of the Uganda as a whole.
It is most unfortunate and unhappy that the Kabaka should have taken the stand that he did. He may have had his own private reasons for doing it. We do not know. Many of us who met him when he was over here during the Coronation were greatly impressed with his personality and dignity. But in these matters—and we know it from the experience of our own history—one has to take into consideration not merely personalities but the interests of the community, of the nation as a whole.
Friend's decision will enable the Governor to continue with the reforms which he intends to introduce and to bring nearer the day when we shall find in Uganda a model experiment in democratic government, which will hold out hope not only for East Africa but for Africa as a whole. I would remind the right hon.
Member for Llanelly Mr. Griffiths that if he takes this matter to a Division he will be criticising not my right hon.
Friend the Colonial Secretary but primarily the Governor of Uganda. I cannot believe that those of us—and I am sure there are many here—who know the Governor of Uganda, who know his liberal and progressive point of view, would be prepared to go into the Lobby tonight in support of a Motion of censure upon such a very distinguished servant of the Crown. Member for Colchester Mr. Alport , referred early in his speech to the need for co-operation between the small units of the Commonwealth.
Personally, I should entirely agree with him. I think that the difficulty is in the method by which to achieve that co-operation and the speed with which it is brought into being. The disagreements over Central African Federation were not upon the desirability of federation so much as upon the need to carry the Africans with us, and to ensure that we were going some way towards solving the social difficulties which exist in multi-racial communities.
Later in his speech he very pertinently drew attention to those difficulties—the tribal traditions, the supremacy of one tribe, and the trouble which arose when one attempted to mingle with those traditions our traditions of Western democratic government and progress.
He may very well have put his finger on one of the chief underlying causes for the trouble in Uganda, but I was not entirely convinced that, having pointed to those causes, he was justified in saying that the solution found by the Secretary of State was the only possible and desirable one.
There are very serious difficulties in this territory. As the Secretary of State has said, the Kabaka refused to appoint representatives to the Council, and desired to secede and so break up Uganda. I do not think that anyone in this House would approve either of those steps.
The Secretary of State, in turn, has taken a most serious step in depriving this man of his liberty and deporting him from his territory. That is, possibly, as serious a step as sentencing him to imprisonment. My right hon. Friend is not depriving him of his liberty. There is no justification for that statement. Many of the Attorney-General's distinguished predecessors would take a curious view of his argument that freedom exists for a man when he is banished from his country.
The classical writers of Greece and Rome would surely have held that banishment is incompatible with freedom. The Secretary of State should have told us more about the reasons which led the Kabaka to propose these serious steps, such as secession. It may be that for diplomatic reasons the right hon. Gentleman was unwilling to go into them in too great detail, but the hon.
Member for Colchester has indicated what many of us thought might be one of the underlying causes of this difficulty. The Secretary of State merely told us that the Kabaka had refused to co-operate.
Presumably the Kabaka advanced some reasons for his refusal, and the House is entitled to know more from the Government as to what his arguments were. Why did the Kabaka want to come under the Foreign Office? If any of his reasons or arguments are justifiable, what is being done, or what can be done, to rectify the matter? This debate will not have fulfilled its chief purpose unless these questions are answered.
We are bound to point out to the Government that the Commonwealth has suffered some very serious shocks recently. Our people are a little bewildered, when they wake up in the morning to find that the Constitution of Guiana has been suspended, and the Kabaka has been deposed and, in a different context, to learn of the events in the Sudan.
These difficulties cannot be attributed to individual Members. I do not believe that the hon. Brockway or the Colonial Secretary wants to break up the Commonwealth. These difficulties arise from deep, continuing and underlying causes which concern us all.
He said it is a wrong response to the rampant evictions and land disputes in the country. While commemorating his 28th coronation …. Like it has been in most of the previous confrontations, land is at the centre ….
July 31, NEWS 0. The Kabaka was travelling to Lwengo district for celebrations of his 28th coronation anniversary due today. Security personnel had a tough time enforcing …. April 2, NEWS 0. The resurrection of Jesus Christ reminds us of …. November 29, NEWS 0. Just like any other king, Mujaguzo also has his own palace, palace guards, officials and servants. When a new prince or princess is born in the kingdom, drummers from a specific clan are selected to sound these Royal Drums.
This is how they communicate to the subjects of Buganda that a new member has been welcomed in the royal family. Before the officials declare the human prince as new Kabaka , he must first perform special cultural rites on these Royal drums.
Sounding the Royal drums can also be an official communication that the kingdom has lost the ruling king. However, in Buganda, the Kabaka does not die but gets lost in the forest.
The forest where the Kabaka gets lost is found in the royal tombs at Kasubi tombs and Wamala tombs. The Kasubi tombs are found in Kampala and are one of the areas we recommend our visitors who wish to have a cultural experience around Kampala.
It has several buildings but the main hut is where the forest is found and had mausoleums of four former kingdoms of Buganda before it was destroyed by fire on March 17, Princes in Buganda kingdom are treated equally if not yet enthroned as new king after the death of the Kabaka.
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