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KATONGOLE ARNOLD
“ Ugandans should embrace Kiswahili, the language has for overtime been denigrated by some Ugandans for its application by militias.” Remarks of First Deputy Prime Minister of Uganda and Minister for East African Community Affairs Hon. Rebecca Kadaga .
She made the comments during a presser ahead of the Kiswahili Day that is going to be celebrated tomorrow 6 July and Friday 7July 2023. Kiswahili language is a combination of Arabic and costal Bantu Languages, spoken by a population of 63.5million as a dialect and over 160 as a second language. The language is spoken officially in four major countries of Tanzania Kenya Uganda and Rwanda.
As a minority language it’s recognized in Burundi, DR Congo, Central African Republic and Mozambique. Swahili is shared among regional bodies of East African Community (EAC), African Union (AU), Southern Africa Development Community (SADC),among others.
This year’s theme is “Kiswahili and multilingualism Achieving more together .” This is possible and visible with Uganda taking the first step forward to organize the second edition of the day celebration and adding Swahili as the ninth subject on the rolled out new lower secondary curriculum for Schools in Uganda.
Kadaga, addressed the issue of few Kiswahili teachers in the country during the presser at her office at Kingdom Kampala. Kadaga said her ministry together with the government and ministry of Education will solve this issue. Speaker Emeritus of 9th and 10th parliament Hon. Kadaga affirmed to government’s intentions to start Kiswahili teaching at Primary level to solve the predicament of students failing to understand the language in the later stage of high school.
Hon. Kadaga, further confirmed that the two day event shall have guests including the speaker of the East African parliament, ministers, policy makers and all stakeholders to find better mechanism to inculcate the Kiswahili language as a culture to foster development and regional ties with a common language as Kiswahili.
