Norah Owaraga

Advocating for children’s rights

Each time I am prompted to write about a random act of kindness I have done for someone, I instantly remember the weekend around 3rd October 2016. A child, a young girl, clearly mentally ill is reported to have wandered away from the major mental health care facility in Uganda – Butabika National Mental Referral Hospital – which…

Cry Uganda’s children, African extended family broken down

I was lucky to be borne while five of my paternal grandmothers (RIP) were still alive. They told us stories of how they had a collective responsibility for raising all their children. My father was breastfed by multiple mothers, the story goes. If one of my grandmothers for some reason was not able at a…

Suspected conman ‘Gen Isa’ put out of commission

According to East News, ‘General Isa’, a conman who has been masquerading as a Uganda People’s Defense Forces (UPDF) General and scamming foreign investors has been arrested. If it is true he is such a conman, there will be many ordinary Ugandans who are happy he has been put out of commission. The plethora of…

Open house policy at expense of own children

There was this expectation those days for one to operate a open house policy, in which extended family members were welcome to stay all the time and at the expense of one’s own children. Okay, I must honestly disclose that I think because my late papa favored me, I do not recall being inconvenienced as…