Ethnicity and residential location in Kampala-Mengo (1890-1968)

Abstract

This thesis presents a theory of urban residential settlement for Kampala-Mengo between 1890 and 1968.

It has been shown in this work, that the historical events that saw the creation of Kampala in 1890, as an imperial town next to influence and Mengo, mostly an indigenous town, had a strong determined the eventual residential settlement patterns, until the dual cit y ceased to exist in 1968, when both municipalities were merged into one single urban aglomeration.

The hypothesis put forward in this study is that residential settlement location in Kampala- Mengo was based on racial and ethnic considerations, which were the result of (a) imperial urban administration policy, and (b) contrasting social-cultural characteristics within the African urban population itself.

After defining the operational terminology, the theory identifies three distinctive settlement areas, at the macro-level, for each of the three races (European, Asian and African) forming the population of Kampala- Mengo at the time. These areas have been identified, basically, as the highlands on the two central hills in the city centre for the Europeans; the lower slopes of the hill where the CBD was located for the Asians; and the surrounding valley settlement s outside Kampala township boundaries, for the African migrants.

We have, at the macro-level, also identified the area surrounding the indigenous settlement at Mengo and extending towards the north, west and south as a settlement for the nhost'' tribal group (the Baganda), while the rest of the African migrants settled in the low-lying areas at the boundaries between both townships and, at a later stage, in the east of Kampala.

At the micro-level, three categories of ethnicity have been defined, and according to these, ethnic clustering in various settlement areas has been shown to exist, at different levels. Generally, supporter settlements have been found to present tribal group and linguistic category clusters while public housing estates exhibited tribal, linguistic and nationality types of ethnic clustering.

It is suggested, in the concluding chapter, that while these initial patterns may be undergoing a process of transformation, the impact they had on the city's residential settlement structure is s till evident and will continue to influence further developments for some time yet.