From where we were, in the Rift Valley (Kenya), the border with Uganda is quite close and there is also a good public transport connection. Before we advance towards our 10 interesting facts about Uganda. let us tell you some other moments of the tour, as soon as we could, we took a bus to cross the border until we reached the capital of the country, Kampala. Now here are our 10 interesting facts about Uganda.
Interesting facts about Uganda
- It became independent from the United Kingdom in 1962.
- From its independence until 1986 there were coups detect, bloody dictatorships and civil war. Electoral processes have been applied since 1986 … although it can be said that political parties were banned until 2006.
- There is still guerrilla activity by the Lord’s Resistance Army, a Christian terrorist organization, leader of which is the fanatic Joseph Kony, accused by various human rights groups of committing serious violations of International Humanitarian Law, including the kidnapping of people, the use of child soldiers and a large number of massacres.
- The average number of children per woman is almost 7 children, one of the highest rates in the world.
- The life of Idi Amin, a Ugandan dictator and genocide, was picked up by the journalist Giles Foden in the book `The Last King of Scotland ‘, which was also made into a film adaptation.
- In Uganda are the sources of the Nile, the source of this river, in Lake Victoria.
- Uganda has been, for ten centuries, the melting point of some forty different ethnic groups, all of them belonging to the three main linguistic families: Bantu, Nilotic and Hamitic.
- Called “the Pearl of Africa” by Winston Churchill, in Uganda lives a great diversity of African fauna including endangered species such as mountain gorillas and chimpanzees.
- Approximately 50% of the Mountain Gorilla population is in Uganda. Only about 700 individuals of this endangered species survive in 3 countries that also include Rwanda and the Democratic Republic of the Congo.
- Agriculture is the most important sector of the economy. It represents more than 80% of the labor force and the most significant income comes from the export of coffee.
