H.E Paul Kagame's address at Ntare School last week

 

 

Thank you Yoweri Kaguta Museveni President of the Republic of Uganda.

I wish to also thank the Ntare School Old Boys Association and all the Old Boys who are here and even those who are not here.

Mr. President I wish to say that for those of us who came from Rwanda, it was not just a matter of coming from Rwanda to Uganda. There is indeed a special connection. So to speak, it was really like coming back home. I will explain a little bit, this special connection.

 

President Kagame addresses Ntare OBs and students

-This school, Ntare School provided for many of us a home as well as education. As you alluded to, many of the people who came with me from Rwanda, attended this school while most of them were coming from refugee camps. They were refugees. Most of us were refugees. That meant we really did not have a home in terms of a country, a nation. Our country had rejected us for some bad political reasons.

I am sure if one looked at the statistics you would find that probably most of those young boys, the refugees, passed through Ntare School, I think, more than any other school. So this was giving us a home as well as the education we got from Ntare school.

However, this goes also for the country of Uganda. It was Ntare School, but it was also Uganda. Uganda provided for many of us a home. So, for us, in a special way, coming to Ntare School and coming back to Uganda is really homecoming. And that also provided to a lot of us a lot of opportunities which we built on to find the home that we had been denied for many years. So there is really very strong connection.

-Let me say another thing, another special connection because here we were celebrating the school having produced two Heads of State -two Presidents. Maybe it has not happened before. In the tradition of Ntare School, and again the President did mention that; as we are talking about old boys, within the old Boys there were old boys and the young boys and the new boys. The old, would look after the young, etc, and it went on like that.

In Ntare School, therefore, being able to produce two Presidents, we started with one President, who was at one time the President of the other. I, therefore, refer to President Yoweri Museveni as my President, because he used to be my Commander in Chief as well at some point. In the old tradition of Ntare School, therefore, the old President looked after the young to become President.

Again, really, there is that strong connection -strong connection of the school, Ntare School, for many of us from Rwanda who are here. There is the connection in a wider context that we were brought up here in Uganda and availed opportunities that we could otherwise or easily have been denied like we were denied in our own country; but the society in Uganda, the people of Uganda provided these opportunities on which we were able to build and became who we later turned out to become.

And really nothing more than we deserved we became what we became and we deserved to have that in the first place. We deserved to have back our country, and we deserved to have all the rights of the citizens of our country as the citizens of other countries have the rights in many ways.

Again in celebrating these 50 years of age of this otherwise still very strong lion, Ntare school, I think there could not have been a better way of making that home-coming as we did today. To have come back to celebrate with you; the Golden Jubilee of Ntare School is in itself an exciting event and moment for us.

As for continuing to take forward this connection we have with Ntare School and with Uganda and making some contribution to the continued development of this 50 years old wonderful school, we are really in some symbolic way but very important to us, trying to give back something to the people; the school that gave us a lot more than we can give back.

There are, therefore, still challenges ahead; challenges to all of us to be able to continue taking the school, our countries to greater heights, our people; and there are challenges to the young boys of this school as well. My word of advice to them is that they should work very hard as the old boys did; and we expect nothing less from them.

Maybe in another 50 years we should produce three Presidents; hopefully, the two of us -the old boy of Ntare and the old President and myself. The old boy of this school and the younger President can help bring up a few other Presidents, who maybe will come from Ntare School.

I wish to thank you very much, and again thank the President and the Headmaster of this school and Ntare School old Boys’ Association members for really having had to shift this event to another date just to accommodate me. I am grateful because they did not have to do it, but they did, and availed me the opportunity to come here and celebrate with you this occasion that is dear and important to all of us.

Thank you very much and God bless all of us.