UGANDA COMMUNITY MUSEUMS ASSOCIATION

LAUNCHING PHASE 2 PROJECT FOR STRENGTHENING THE CAPACITY OF COMMUNITY MUSEUMS IN PROMOTING THE ICH IN UGANDA

ABOVE IS A GROUP PHOTO OF COMMUNITY MUSEUM MANAGERS,ICH KNOWLEDGE BEARERS,MGLSD OFFICIALS,UNCC REPRESENTATIVES,THE DEPUTY ED OF CCCFU,UCOMA EXECUTIVES AND THE TEAM OF YOUTH DURING THE LAUNCH OF THE 2ND PHASE

In 2020, Uganda Community Museums Association (UCOMA) received a grant of 60,000 US $ to strengthen the capacity of 5 CMs to promote 5 of the 6 Inscribed ICH elements;

1. Bigwala music and dance of Busoga Kingdom,

2. The skill of Bark cloth making among the Baganda,

3. Koogere Oral Traditions of the communities of Toro,

4. Empako naming ceremony of the communities of Bunyoro and

5. The Madi Bow lyre and music of the Madi people.

However, the project ended up covering all the 6 ICH elements.

The CMs that implemented this project are: Kigulu CM, UMU-Nkozi CM, Koogere CM, URDT CM and Madi CM.

We used the funding as expected and we went an extra mile and included the 6^th element; the male child cleansing ritual of the people of Lango found in Central Northern Uganda. Several key outputs were produced including a publication and a documentary film, profiling all the 6 elements.

Around March this year, we received approval of our funding application (90,000 US $) to UNESCO to upscale this project to 12 CMs. The additional 7 CMs are: 1. Cultural Research Center – Jinja.2. St. Luke CM in Kyotera. 3. Buddu CM in Masaka. 4. Bunyoro CM – Hoima. 5. Bugungu Heritage CM IN Buliisa. 6. Museum of Acholi Art and Culture and Lango Cultural Institution (Culture department). However, the final decision on which CMs to work with under this project shall be made after assessing their suitability and readiness during the pre-visits which have already started with Nkozi, Buddu and Kyotera museums.

UNDER THIS PROJECT, WE HOPE TO HAVE THE FOLLOWING ACTIVITIES:

1. Introductory meeting: Organize a one-day meeting in Kampala to introduce the project to key stakeholders, including government agencies such as the Ministry of Gender Labor and Social Development and the Uganda National Commission for UNESCO. [which is happening today]

2. Carry out pre-visits to the selected CMs in the districts of Lira, Moyo, Kikuube, Kabarole, Mpigi, Masaka, Kyotera, Jinja and Bugweri to assess their suitability and readiness to contribute to the project implementation.

3. Organize a four-day capacity building training workshop with the participation of museum managers, bearers, representatives from local authorities and religious leaders on the cultural and social significance of the six intangible cultural heritage elements of Uganda and some other ICH elements worth documenting.

4. National exhibition for the six ICH elements. We hope to establish a National Organizing Committee (NOC) to be responsible for the coordination and organization of the national exhibition on the six elements. It will be composed of representatives from UCOMA, the National Culture Forum, and the Uganda National Commission for UNESCO, the Uganda National Museum and the Uganda National Centre for Culture.

CMs shall be supported to develop exhibition materials (texts, images and videos).

CMs shall be supported to organize a three-day exhibition at one location to raise awareness of these elements and on the importance of safeguarding living heritage. And we hope to design and produce T-shirts to be distributed during these exhibitions.

5. Training on strategies to safeguarding living heritage: We intend to develop a training manual on strategies for safeguarding living heritage through community development interventions.

We shall organize a four-day training session addressed to museum managers, ICH knowledge bearers, local government authorities, youth and cultural institutions to explain the importance of community museums and present the content of the training manual.

6 Micro-grants to the community museums: We intend to provide micro-grants to the twelve (12) community museums (including Lango CI), to implement initiatives to safeguard their intangible cultural heritage while promoting traditional community safeguarding mechanisms.

7. National conference on safeguarding intangible cultural heritage in Uganda: we hope to hold a one-day national conference to discuss and define measures to safeguard intangible cultural heritage in Uganda. Participants will include community museum managers, community leaders, religious leaders, and government officials and youth representatives. It is anticipated that at the end of the conference, a national coalition shall be established composed of intangible cultural heritage experts to collectively promote the safeguarding measures for ICH elements.

8. Review the current documentary on the 6 ICH elements and produce additional copies. The documentary aims to highlight the roles of community museum managers and community members in Uganda.

9. Capacity-building on mainstreaming ICH in social media and digital platforms: we shall organize a three-day capacity-building event for museum managers on how to mainstream intangible cultural heritage elements in social media and digital platforms.

We hope to provide relevant equipment, to the implementing museums to facilitate the transmission of knowledge and skills on living heritage to young people by the community museum managers.

10. Monitoring and evaluation: we shall conduct regular visits and meetings to monitor, evaluate and report on the project progress and performance. We shall carry out regular monitoring and support visits to community museums and hold meetings with bearer communities to assess the implementation of the project.

11. Financial audit of the project: We shall have regular auditing of all our works and expenditures.

All these activities shall be done in a period not exceeding 24 months effective August 2024.

MY CULTURE; MY HERITAGE

FOR GOD AND MY COUNTRY