Kikuku Innocent’s is one story of inspiration. A resident deep in a village in Kagadi, Mpigi District, he has deep aspirations to impact society with advocacy for the better for us all.
“I want to be a lawyer and human rights activist” he says which calling he wants to use to offer “free services to people who need legal assistance in relation to education, human rights violations, land and health.” He also wants to found an NGO that fights corruption in Uganda, and “more so in the public service.”
He would have been studying teaching now if it wasn’t for a change in interests.
“I wanted to be a teacher” he shares, but after he saw increasing land disputes in his home area, so many incidences of torture, people being conned at police stations because of ignorance of the law, his choices then changed to law.
To further his education, Kikuku has been a weekend visitor in Kansanga, Kampala, spending weekends to attend classes in Bachelor of Laws at Kampala International University (KIU), a step towards his future profession, while staying those nights as a “squatter” in his friends’ rooms, then back to his village for the weekdays.
When asked why KIU, he says according to him, the university offered the best law on private, also relatively cheaper, while allowing him to study weekend programs.
In his village in Mpigi, he continues his hustles, struggling to be able to raise the tuition of UGX. 2.4 million or so, paid every other semester at the university. Working at someone’s 9.5 acre pineapple farm, most times as a supervisor to the farm workers, then some other times, a farmer, he was able to raise tuition with the contribution from his mother for the entire year 1, and semester one of year 2.
The mother farmed a piece of land near their home, land she did not own. It is from here that she generated income for school.
Then came his lowest moment a few weeks ago. Mother has been sick. The land she farmed was taken back by the owner who wanted the same for personal use. The boss to the farm where he worked stopped facilitating the workers on the pineapple farm, then the November 2019 rains hit, and the project was neglected as “he (owner of the farm) was not making profit”.
He then decided to leave Mpigi, destined for the city.
“My mum says I should try town as there are no opportunities in Mpigi”, he intimates as life got harder.
When he came to Kampala, he started staying at his friends’ rooms near his university. But then, one of them was doing a diploma, finished and left, the other now has a roommate. He slept in the diploma friend’s room until the landlord chased him out.
“When it landed in the ears of the landlord that am no longer studying, he requested me to leave his house” he recalls after he had slept in the room for a month and a week. Evicted and shelterless, and tuition troubles.
Tuition for semester two fails
Kikuku has failed to raise tuition for the second semester that started about two weeks ago, and has since applied for a dead year. A dead year ordinarily stagnates your schooling such that even if you stopped school today, you can always come back later and continue from where you stopped as opposed to the alternative where you would have to repeat the entire year, worse whole course.
Beat down and aspirations partly shattered, Kikuku has resorted to the streets where he lays his not-more-than 13 shirts for merchandise on the floor of the busiest places in Kampala, and impatiently expecting that market forces of demand and supply will draw a buyer to his spot in a very competitive market where mostly the cheapest sells, yet he has to raise tuition.
“I resorted to selling second hand clothings” he says, and with limited capital of UGX. 20,000 that he received from a good samaritan three weeks ago, he bought his first 5 shirts from Owino market and sold them for the littlest profit. When he gets profit, he adds it into more shirts, sells, and buys more, then sells. This is his basic business/hustle model.
If you have been in Kampala busiest areas (in front of Owino or near the Queen’s way or clock tower), you will visualize what picture this paints. Hawkers shouting discounted prices for their merchandise, while passers-by are just not easily persuaded.
He has to be at his spot around 6pm or 7pm early enough for the beginning of the evening as it is a first come first serve basis to secure one. The struggle to secure a place “sometimes it disorganises you” delaying the start of business. Sometimes he is forced to relocate.
He has sold a few clothes, and now does not want go back to the village as he hopes for a future with prospects.
“I do not want to go home. My aim is to be here and not village” he says revealing he wants to stay in Kampala to be able to raise his tuition to complete his 4 year course.
Inspirations and future.
He gets his inspiration from stars like Maama_Fiina (traditional healer), Ssegirinya_Muhammad (a leader at KCCA), Bebe Cool (artist), Sipapa (artist), Balaam Barugahare (events manager), Bajjo Events, Dr. Kiiza Besigye (the world’s most arrested man), the CEO YY Coaches (travel buses) and Frank Gashumba (a business man) which people he says are not show offs as people think but “these people are doing great work and they inspire many out there with activities related to charity.
Those inspirations he hopes will make him a lawyer and human rights activist, be a promoter of education, an MP for his constituency, a best serving civil servant, and run his NGO one day to fight corruption.
Kikuku is wishing he could land a scholarship to complete his law degree, or assistance in form of capital to run his hustle or capital for agriculture so that he could raise tuition and complete school.
But Kampala hits hard differently, but he is optimistic about what the future will present to him and advises students in a similar predicament to do the best they can to survive while encouraging others to study hard.
“Those who have the opportunity to study (should) make the best use of it and those who have food to eat should eat because many are out there can’t get it”, he advises.
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