The brain stroke that hit the composer of the Uganda national anthem, Prof George Kakoma, has left his family in pain.
The 88 year old now feeds through a tube and can only communicate through facial expressions. His wife, Maria Thereza Kakoma says it is very hard and painful to see him in his current condition.
Thereza says early this year upon falling ill, he underwent treatment and were set to return to their village home in Wakiso. However, her daughter called her and informed her that her husband had been rushed to hospital for emergency care.
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She narrates that the doctors described his attack as a massive stroke of the brain. Now, he can neither say a word nor lift a finger, he’s in perpetual silence.
Kakoma’s nurse, Juma Matanda, who has been attending to him for the last seven months describes him as a kind and patriotic man. Matanda says his current condition happened after he got a sudden attack and convulsed for about 30 minutes. This, according to Matanda, weakened a man who previously could talk, eat and sit on his wheel chair.
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Thereza has tried all efforts to awaken him including playing his favourite classical music such as Mozart and Bark but was disappointed that it didn’t work.
She adds that his doctors then advised her to take him off medication, only then did he start opening his eyes, making gestures and raising his eyebrows in recognition of his surroundings.
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Thereza adds that whenever her daughter knelt by his bed side to pray, he would cry, until she stopped their daughter from performing emotional prayers.
In spite this trying time for the family, Thereza says even if Kakoma died now, he has lived his life and cannot complain. She says her only complaint to God is that he has been in the same condition for so long unlike others who fall ill and recover.
Mrs. Kakoma, a retired primary school teacher who is now into farming, describes the music professor as a simple Ugandan musician who is highly trained to play many instruments.
Kakoma was very quick to make friends and as a student at Kings College Budo in the 1940’s he was the best organist. She reveals that he was a very good mathematician and thought he would be an engineer, but because of his talent his former teachers and friends advised him to take music.
He was given a small house near the chapel so that he could easily practice for church service. That house still stands to-date. Luckily, two of his grandchildren have gone to the same school and boast of the house to school mates.
When he left Kings College Budo, he went to East Africa Conservatoire of Music School in Nairobi in 1947 and left for the UK at the end of that year. He joined the royal College of Music in until 1952.
He returned to Uganda and worked as Inspector of schools for music. In Kampala, he organized many musical festivals, while he worked with the Kampala Singers singing as a soloist in the 1960s.
Kakoma loved Opera music and was such a simple, humble man who kept a low profile even after he composed the national anthem. He is well traveled and he was still planning to travel to Australia when he fell sick.
