Lango Conference 2012

The Lango people from the Lango sub-region in Northern Uganda have taken time off to reflect on their past and present and design guiding strategies for the future. A three-day conference dubbed 'Lango Conference 2012' has been organized for this purpose. It started today 27 December 2012 and ends 29 December 2012. At the end of day three resolutions and recommendations will be presented, discussed and agreed to by representatives of the community. I will be one of them and I am excited about it because I am proud to be a member of this community. I will be twitting so please follow me @sgokech.

Two terms of service to the Veterinary Fraternity

I thank them heartily. They being the larger portion of the veterinary fraternity in Uganda, members of the veterinary profession's umbrella body in Uganda - Uganda Veterinary Association (UVA). It was on Friday 5th December 2008 that they first put trust in me and my team to lead them. They renewed the mandate on Friday 10th December 2010 for two years. That made it two terms for me in office as President Uganda Veterinary Association.

After a period of four straight years of faithful and dedicated service as some of my colleagues called it, last week I handed over the mantle of UVA leadership to one of my colleagues, Dr. Dominic Venture Lali Mundrugo-ogo. To work with him is a team that I know all too well so I rest assured that progress is all that will happen for the UVA; a process I prefer to refer to as "moving from glory to glory". What this means is that my team and I were able to move this organisation through positive strides and with the new team, the organisation should be able to take several other strides in the right direction.

The four years I did this voluntary work have been years of unlimited exposure, networking, servant leadership, great sacrifice, juggling strategy & operations, mentoring & empowering, innovations, venturing into unknowns, fighting oppression, team building & management, managing criticism, arbitration & conflict resolution, initiating & refining strategies, perfecting boardroom etiquette, productive negotiation, etc. All these could be summed up as a period of tremendous learning. I am definitely much wiser. I should be able to share the key areas of learning either in a series on this blog or maybe in a book. May God help me and may He bless Uganda Veterinary Association, its entire membership and the global vet fraternity.

EPL referees contemplate boycot? What a joke!

It is reported that referees in England are contemplating boycotting Chelsea FC games. Anybody who follows the Barclays English Premiership would predict that such an issue could only come up in association with the name of Chelsea FC. This is not because CFC deserves anything like this but simply because they are 'hated'. They cried foul over alleged referee's 'misconduct' (read inappropriate words) in addition to two game-changing blatant errors he made during the Chelsea vs Manchester United game last Sunday and that earns them such hatred and a possibility of such an extreme action!

What did CFC do to FA? I wrote before about the charges meted out to their managers, Jose Mourinho and Andre Villas-Boas. I bet that if it was any other club making such complaint this drastic action would not have even been thought of at all.

On the other hand, I think the EPL referees are doing a great job to distract people from their recent poor performances, the one by Clattenberg being so far the worst and most blatant this season! In the same weekend Liverpool FC was denied three points due to a poor decision by a match official. A few minutes ago I saw a West Ham goal disallowed erroneously!

Love them, hate them, CFC is still very much a factor not only in EPL but in Europe. Talk about Europe reminds of the injustice by a one Ovrebo, a UEFA referee. Guess against which club. CFC.

Komla Dumor on "right to roam"

Reading the Kenya Airways (KQ) inflight magazine for September-October 2012, I came across an article by Komla Dumor about visa-free entry into African countries and the benefits thereof. Interestingly, I was traveling to a meeting in Nairobi to discuss issues related to free movement of professional services (read professionals) across the borders of the 5-member countries of the East African Community (EAC).

Komla asserts that free movement of people has significant economic benefits for host countries as well. I need the source of evidence supporting this. I am not doubting Komla. I am actually inclined to agree entirely with him but providing such evidence would help us strengthen our push for the free movement of people (labour and services) in the EAC.

This article also reminded me of my related one earlier published in this blog. You might find the opinion interesting to read: http://samwiri.blogspot.com/2012/06/some-10-points-for-professionals-to.html

Jose Mourinho: the special one or the only one?

Jose Mourinho in the hot seat at CNN. Visit and listen to what he has to say HERE.

Saving for economic empowerment

Today, 28th July 2012 goes in the history books as the day the Veterinary Wealth Savings and Credit Cooperative Society (Vet Wealth SACCO) held its first Annual General Meeting and constituted its first Board and Supervisory Committee. The meeting was held at the College of Veterinary Medicine, Animal Resources and Biosecurity in Makerere University. It is a development for which I greatly thank God for letting me and several colleagues be part of from inception through registration to now full composition of the governing structures.

This SACCO is one step of demonstrating that veterinarians in Uganda have embraced the principle of harnessing synergies and are willing to use it to improve their economic position and capacity of offering services and support to the community.

Long live Vet Wealth SACCO.

Gone to the dogs. Why dogs?

In some cultures in the world, animals are praised, adored, almost regarded as human and in some (almost) worshiped. While this demonstrates the close ties and mutually beneficial relationship between man and animals, man also coined a saying that seems to suggest a demeaning of the animal - at least one specie which ironically, on the other hand, is also described as "man's best friend".

The saying "gone to the dogs" is used to describe something or a situation that has gone bad or lost all good things associated with it. The question is, why the dogs when it is known that in many cultures, dogs are very important members of the family and community for various reasons: company, hunting, security, recreation (sports), disaster prediction, etc?

Which culture coined this saying and why? Join me in searching for the answer. As we search, I think we (humans) should also stop 'messing up things' and quickly (as if to avoid responsibility) say they have 'gone to the dogs' instead of admitting that 'we have, in our normal minds, deliberately chosen to mess the things up so badly that they are not even useful to us anymore'. Why don't we 'take these things to the angels' instead? Let us strive to make things better.