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The impact of language in any society around the world can not be undermined. It's what we use to express our feelings and what's going on in our minds. This makes it key in being a vessel for human philosophy, values, attitudes, identity and meaning of life.
Basing on this, the government of Uganda has made Kiswahili the 2nd official language in the country after English. This inorder to facilitate communication with the countries in the East African Community region. It has already been included on syllabuses in schools starting from nursery level up to university level. And classes for members of Parliament have started as well.
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EAC
Uganda is part of the East African Community, which includes Burundi, Kenya, Rwanda, Tanzania, South Sudan and the latest to join, Democratic Republic of Congo. The EAC, whose headquarters are located in Tanzania, was founded in 1999 with the purpose of promoting regional integration by improving business and community links in the region.
Inorder for EAC's agenda to work clearly, a common language needed to be in place to be used in communicating across borders. And given that Kiswahili is already the official language in the 6 of the other countries apart from Uganda, it was the preferred choice by the community to have it as the mode of communication within the regions. This would help in deepening and widening the integration process.
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It was upon Uganda to adopt the language to ease communication with all the other neighboring countries in the region which already use it.
Challenges
Much as the government is taking the required measures to promote the adoption of the language in the country, it's facing some hindrances which include;
•Opposition from the general public. People are not comfortable putting in the effort to learn Kiswahili when they are already communicating amongst themselves using their local languages and English.
And to make matters worse, most people associate it with the military, which for long has been known for torture and deaths of people opposing the government. Kiswahili is already the mode of communication in the military in Uganda. This dates way back in the known dictator Idi Amin's regime where soldiers used the language to unleash terror on civilians.
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•Lack of funds to facilitate Kiswahili education. Such a massive project requires a lot of resources to facilitate. Publishing Kiswahili books, funding teachers to teach Kiswahili subjects etc, this calls for a lot of finances to support and yet the government has always fallen short when it comes to funding big projects.
Every big goal however requires small steps to achieve. And with the start of Kiswahili education adoption in schools, there is much hope of having a fully speaking Kiswahili generation in the future.
Kiswahili Day
Kiswahili is already famous internationally, being recognized as a language of unity with even the United Nations Educational Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) declaring July 7 as the Kiswahili language day.
This leaves Uganda with no choice but to adopt it as fast as it can.