THE PUB : Braza K’s foul tactics to win Koku in BKB

You’re somewhere in Kagera, well over 1,500km drive from Dar. Yeah, a man from Kandeland is attending to a family matter in Matokeland. One Bongo, one people!

Among the Muyanza mini-clan, we’ve offspring who answer to the names Tibagenda and Kekolanula. And from the look of things, Kemilembe and Buberwa are on the way. All these wazee –more so those of Busindi Village—who answer to names such as Rwezaura, Rubanza, Lwaitama are your dads-in-law.

Now the Creator has recalled a mom-in-law and we’re all here to lay her to rest. May He rest our mom’s soul in eternal peace.

After all the essentials are concluded, you, together in-laws Kahabuka and Rutashubanyuma plus your clansman Braza Kay head to the nearest shopping centre for the right place to drown our sorrows.

We soon end up at PR, a blossoming shopping centre that, you learn, is thanks to a certain nshomile son of the area who single-handedly built up a whole neighbourhood, availing it with shop frames, a police post, police quarters, market stalls, a mosque, a church, a playground…etc, etc. This is Patriotism.

It’s a nice “grocery”, this PR drinking place. It offers drinks and modest boarding facilities and things to eat. The architect who designed this outfit did a splendid job, you say. Braza Kay suggests this could as well be somewhere in Dar. His uncle, Kahabuka, takes that as a compliment to, not Busindi, but to the whole of Kagera. “Sisi tumeendelea, in fact, there’re many groceries like this in our region,” he brags.

The round thatched huts are beautiful. It’s a pity that at no time do you see them filled with drinkers. “At Christmas, drinkers fill all the huts, not now…everybody has gone back to Dar now,” explains Kokujuka who is the akaunta, deejay, barmaid and guest house keeper rolled into one. We’re all impressed by the washrooms—very spacious and clean, much as something could be done to improve the water flow system.

You tell the kitchen boy you could do with chicken and he says no problem. “Just give me fifteen thou and I’ll get one from the neighbourhood.” Indeed, within an hour or so, you’re all enjoying a sumptuous meal of kuku wa kienyeji with genuine, fresh boiled matoke. All of you are so impressed you tell both Kokujuka and the kitchen boy, Jackson, should feel free to visit Dar and you’ll be their hosts.

“You could actually come and there and serve as manager at my lodge in Dar,” says Braza Kay who indeed owns a lodge of sorts in the commercial capital.

Rutashubyanyuma opposes the idea, arguing that even Busindi needs hoteliers of Kokujuka’s high calibre. He’s right, but it doesn’t matter, really. Why, you know for a fact Braza Kay isn’t shopping for a new manager—he’s just using unfair means of beating everyone of us in what he must be assuming is a big fight for Kokujuka’s favours. Ahem!