Kampala, Uganda ‘s capital city of about 1.7 million people, is built on many hills. This is the central one, Nakasero, with the state house and upmarket hotels overlooking it all, and the business heart of the city down in the valley.
KAMPALA RISING
By Ciril Jazbec
On the startlingly green shores of Lake Victoria, on the other side of Kenya and Tanzania, a new generation is ready to upend your perception of Africa. The urban, connected and enterprising youth have taken control of technologies at hand to build a different Uganda.
Robots in classrooms. Cellphone apps that measure fetal heart rates, propose where to look for cheapest gas or help you argue with a taxi driver. Digital girl power. Business incubators brimming with ambitious youth.
All that in one megavillage on the lush tropical shores of Lake Victoria, in a country that misinformed people can actually be afraid of. In the city of Kampala, a young connected generation is redefining Uganda and our perception of Africa. They are citizens of the world. They have learned their skills from on-line tutorials, they are called to global meetings, they win international prizes and, heck, they even move a rap star like 50 Cent.
They are all hungry, of course. Hungry for change, for social development, for success and prosperity.
Isaac Oboth was an orphan in a tricky financial situation who utilised web tutorials to make himself a leader of Media 256, a renown videography business. One of their videos has convinced 50 Cent, an American rapper, to support a refugee camp initiative.
Daniel Ogwok, Michael Tukei and Kevin Biretwa are confronting a new challenge: how to calculate a fair fare that would help Android users negotiate with taxi drivers without meters. Their app BodaPay has already done that for customers of passenger motorcycles.
The first RailsGirls event in Uganda was an Outbox initiative, while ThoughtWorks provided the finances and training support. Young women from different walks of life were happy to learn how to make a website using Ruby on Rails.
Jonathan Ochan, an intern at Media 256, at the Mara Launchpad business incubator. Ochan’s hand wound is a sad reminder of the times before 2006 when northern Uganda was still suffering under the Kony rebellion; Ochan’s bus was ambushed and a bullet hit him.
Kampala is a mix of high- rises, posh residential areas, slums and tropical vegetation. Parts of it can be routinely in darkness due to the fact that Uganda does not produce enough electricity, despite boasting the source of the Nile.
Cynthia Babirye is a software engineer who loves creating new stuff. She found RailsGirls a refreshing and somewhat more normal experience after working with boys all the time.
Fundi Bots students Henry Masiriwa, Victor Kawagga and William Odokonyero pose with robots and prototypes. Most are assembled from imported educational kits but “Atobot” is made out of locally accessible materials, for example bicycle parts.
Maureen Agena has been a champion of citizen journalism. She has been trained to be a trainer, assisting Ugandans to get into blogging, podcasts, video, photography, interview techniques and journalism ethics.
Christine Ampaire gathered her team, CodeSync, at a 48-hour hackathon. She attended it out or curiosity with no intention of participating. She ended up meeting four guys and building MafutaGo, a crowdsourcing app that assists drivers with finding the cheapest fuel. The app was the first runner-up at the Barcelona Premier Mobile Awards.
Solomon King believes robotics can help solve major problems of African education. His organisation, Fundi Bots, brings robot kits to classrooms, providing the practical aspect not offered anywhere else. Students integrate work with mechanics, electronics, programming, biology, physics, math and chemistry.
Terry Karungi of Kola Studio, one of the two startups at Outbox, an incubation, collaboration and innovation hub in Kampala. Terry’s team have made Matatu, a popular free smartphone app based on a local card game that they are now trying to monetize.
Collins Mugume has established Meka, a web product platform that was selected for Demo Africa in 2012. Available on all major mobile platforms, its main utility is in comparison shopping that saves buyers time.
Evelyn Namara checking her phone at a gathering of Women In Technology Uganda. When she is not busy helping rural women get access to solar technology, Namara is an instructor for ladies-only networking classes all across the continent.
Kampala developers meet for a monthly happy hour at Hive Colab, the first of a number of technology hubs in the city, established in 2010. The only time they left their computers was when a spontaneous chess tournament broke out.
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Ciril Jazbec – I work as an independent freelance photographer. I have received the Leica Oskar Barnack Award 2013 with the photo story called “Waiting to Move”. I believe my profession is about hard work, passion and love. And nature, if possible. I am grateful for the privilege of being able to pursue this profession that I enjoy immensely.