Chapter 6: At The Prestigious King’s College Budo 1967 – 1971

Joining King’s College Budo

In January 1967, I was among 120 pupils that were admitted to S1 at King’s College Budo, with two other boys from my primary School. I was assigned to Africa House, in which Kenya’s first post-independence Attorney General, was a resident in 1939, when it was known as South Africa. He lived to celebrate his 100th birthday in January 2020, and thereby became recognized as the oldest living old Budonian that year. A school assembly was called, where Mr. Ian Cameron Robinson, the headmaster, introduced the teaching and administrative staff and the house prefects to us. “Budo was founded by the Church Missionary Society in 1906 and we therefore, promote Christian values”, he told us.

We were divided into four streams, each with 30 pupils. We were then given English Comprehension tests to determine who would go into the express class and sit “O” level in senior 3 and who would remain in the regular class that sat in S4. I was pleasantly surprised when my name was announced as one of the sixty pupils who would join the express streams, ‘A’ and ‘B’. There were only two girls in our express classes. The diversity of careers and countries through which 3A 1969, has served humanity is simply amazing. During the Covid pandemic, Muniini Mulera started a class WhatsApp group in which we share our post-Budo journeys to date.

Study And Free Time At Budo

King’s College Budo offered a truly holistic education. You would have been very pressed not to find something to your heart’s content, both academically and in the extra curricula. In my S1, we were confirmed by the Bishop of Namirembe Diocese. After taking our maiden holy communion, we were hosted to a special lunch with chicken and juice. I made some good friends with older boys who became protective and life time friends and that is how I narrowly survived an April Fools Day prank. They invited me to join the scout movement and to take up cricket.

Saturday was the only day when we could discard our uniforms and wear other clothes. It was also our laundry day. Africa house had one of the best functioning radiograms in the school. It was therefore one of the houses that hosted dances, on Saturday afternoons. That is when girls were allowed to come into the boys’ dormitories to socialise. You cannot talk about scouting at Budo without mentioning the masters who were in charge. On the one hand was Colin Davis, the Canada House master, whom we all called “miser”, because of the frugal life he led but who, I later found out, was anything but mean.

My most life changing period was the years at ‘O’ Level, i.e.1967 to 1969. As a teenager, there was so much to discover, experiment and sometimes get into trouble about. While in S2, I was again, like in school, punished for a crime I did not commit. While I played the mouth organ, I was fascinated by the idea of a music band and in my dormitory, I emptied my tin of Danish cookies and used the tin and its cover as drums. Soon word went around that there was a budding drummer in Africa House.

One Saturday Morning in 1968, I went with my bandmates the Rovers to town with the intention of ending up at the Makerere University Farm where our bassist’s mother worked.We were taken around the farm and later, visited the neighbouring girls’ Gayaza High School, where Semivule had some friends. It is said that the girls school was started in 1905, to ensure that the sons of chiefs who went through King’s College Budo would get formally schooled wives. We got back to Budo safely, and with lots of excitement ran to Africa House, to play my new music acquisition of the Lingala dance hit, Kiri Kiri, only to be told that a drummer jazzman friend, had died earlier that day.”

1969 was the year Uganda abandoned the imperial measurement system and introduced the metric system. July 1969, is a month to remember. In neighbouring Kenya, on 5th July, 1969, the Minister for Cooperatives, Tom Mboya was assassinated. On July 20th, 1969, the US put the first man on the moon. Later in July 1969, Pope Paul the 6th visited Uganda. On the political scene, the year’s end was full of tension in the country. On November 21, 1969, Uganda’s first President and Kabaka of Buganda, died in exile in London. On December 19, president Milton Obote survived an assassination attempt. A month later, an assassin claimed the lives of Brigadier Okoya and his wife Anna, in Gulu. 1969 is also the year in which I flew for the first time, first in a military plane then a Police plane.

Going to “A” Level

A dreaded exercise at Budo when Robinson was headmaster was ‘report signing’. The years’ final reports were submitted to him and every student had to enter the headmaster’s office and discuss the report with him. What he wrote on the report would determine your fate in the school. I did not look forward to this year’s report signing because of what had happened at the end of my Senior two. The third term of 1969 was final exams time and there was no time for playing around. When the ‘O’ Level exam results for 1969 were released, Budo was at the top of the heap with an outstanding performance. In 1970, I joined the senior 5 Arts Class, which had 20 boys and six girls. In 1970, Solomon Odaka, one of my brothers from Mama Anna, and from Lumino Primary School, joined S1 at Budo.

One of the most popular clubs at Budo, was the Debating Society. This club over the years has produced world class personalities including two former presidents of the UN Security Council. Another highly educative and personality development activity was the Wednesday night upper school lecture. Prominent scholars, professionals, educationists and politicians were invited to the school two give us a lecture from their field of expertise. The most memorable upper school lecture I attended was one given by Prof. Ali Mazrui (RIP), on President Obote and his love for the figure 5.

Budo Teachers

Guy Rob was an administration and education guru who was thought of very highly by his former students. He, was supported by highly educated, and dedicated staff. Gordon P. McGregor in his book, “King’s College, Budo: A Centenary History 1906-2006,” also documented the Robinson years.