By Timothy Nsubuga

23^rd May 2011:

A protester throwing tear gas canister at police

A certain Philip Nsajja, whom we shall assume is a Ugandan, or is at least a keen observer of Uganda’s recent political upheavals, has produced a powerful montage that documents Uganda’s most recent struggles for freedom and democracy against President Yoweri Museveni’s increasingly repressive regime.

In the accompanying text, Philip Nsajja says, “…through the course of history, movements for change have used music as a powerful vehicle for conveying the tenets of struggle.  The African-American Civil Rights Movement was set to songs of hope, which drew from old Negro Spirituals and Gospel Music. The Anti-Apartheid struggle was, as the South African Jazz pianist and composer Abdullah Ibrahim famously said, was “a revolution in four part harmony”!

Nsajja adds that, “…when powerful words are set to music, they take on an even deeper meaning and have a tendency to strike a chord that not only lifts the spirits, but encourages people to endure and hope; that even against seemingly insurmountable odds, things will get better. Music makes the struggle more worthwhile”, Nsajja emphasises.

It was in that vein, and in the context of the current political situation in Uganda, Nsajja says, that he collected “…a series of images that have been in the headlines…and are now seared in our collective conscience and put together a photo montage that tells the story of what Ugandans have had to endure during the past few weeks”.

Following recent comparisons in the media of Museveni’s regime to South Africa’s defunct Apartheid regime, Nsajja’s montage is fittingly set to two powerful songs that became very popular during South Africa’s Anti-Apartheid struggle; “Something Inside So Strong” and “Thula Sizwe/I Shall Be Released”.

Something Inside So Strong was composed and performed by Labi Siffre.  The song was inspired by a TV documentary that Siffre viewed in 1985 in which a white [Apartheid] soldier was seen shooting at black children; much in the same way in which two year old Julian Nalwanga [RIP] of Masaka was shot dead inside her house by one of Museveni’s trigger happy security operatives.

Appalled by pictorial evidence of the Apartheid regime’s brutality in South Africa, Siffre decided to write Something Inside So Strong as an anti-Apartheid anthem; a sad and yet powerful song that urged Africans [or Ugandans in Nsajja’s context] to stand tall in the face of [Museveni’s] adversity.

Thula Sizwe/I Shall Be Released on the other hand is David Thomas’ rendition of Miriam Makeba and Nina Simone’s fusion of an old Zulu song of hope amidst the pain of Apartheid, with Bob Dylan’s iconic hit, “I Shall Be Released”.

Loosely translated into English, the Zulu words in the song say:  “…Be still nation, don’t cry!  Your Jehovah will conquer for you Freedom, freedom! Your Jehovah will conquer for you”. Please click on the link below to watch Nsajja’s powerful and moving montage.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dN82n3HFW_o&feature=YOUTUBE_GDATA_PLAYER.  END.  Please login to www.ugandacorrespondent.com every Monday to read our top stories and anytime mid-week for our news updates.