Google to help Find Kabaka's Land

A story by The Weekly Observer of December 3, 2008 by The Analyst has picked up lots of interest online because it says online search giant and maker of Google Maps, Google has agreed to help the Kingdom of Buganda to map all the Kabaka's land in order to avoid the central government and President Museveni from stealing it.

I have come across the story and some bloggers actually think it's true. The Analyst is a parody writer who writes satirical and sometimes nonsensical articles that are fun to read.

This particular story is not true but a satirical write up of an ongoing media circus regarding the controversial proposed land law amendments that are being proposed by President Museveni. Some of the paragraphs are simply amazing:

"Those 9,000 square miles must be in the heads of Mengo officials or on mars. We haven't seen them anywhere in Uganda, let alone Buganda. Even if you brought the Son of God, Jesus Christ, He wouldn't show you even a square inch of this land," a government spokesman, Mr. Tamalaako Mulundi, told The Analyst.

Mr Tamalaako Mulundi is a actually a variation of the Minister's real name which is Tamale Mirundi. Tamalaako is a word that means the said Minister is not capable of doing his duties and Mulundi in local languages here means implies the minister is from Burundi. Interestingly, the balaalo who the Kabaka says are going to benefit from the land law ammendmets are Ugandans of Rwandese and Burundi (sort of) descent. This shows how The Analyst is playing around with the name to make the whole story satirical.

Another interesting paragraph in the story is this one:

"Google can even get you a picture of a mulalo urinating on the Kabaka's tree or a government official forging the kyapa [title] to the Kabaka's land. So all that monkey business - with due respect to the nkima clan - will be no more," the Mengo source told The Analyst.

This should clearly show that The Analyst is only joking around. Why would the Kabaka be interested in who is urinating on trees?