Rwenzori Marathon is a good example of job creation and marketing of Uganda

OPINION

By Nathan Namatati

As many government officials are globetrotting to market Uganda in order to create jobs, they forget that what they need to market is what they are leaving behind. As much as I partly agree that bringing Uganda to the western and eastern capitals has benefits, I personally think that bringing the global west to come and interact within the pearl of Africa itself is the best marketing. Uganda is endowed with beauty and natural resources, and I think as government or people, we have failed to clearly articulate how diverse and beautiful this country is. I have done a fair bit of travelling and I want to state that there are few countries with such diversity and beauty.

Each of our regions is endowed with natural beauty and resources that they can survive on their own if marketed well,  from lakes, game parks, mountains and rivers. A certain Nigerian was trying to mock Uganda in comparison to other East African countries; as much as he had some points about the slums or bodabodas he saw around Kampala; he did not see the beauty that lies beyond Kampala. As big as Nigeria is, it does not even have 20% of the beauty Uganda has.

For many years, Amos Wekesa has been drumming about the beauty of Uganda and the need to market it, but somehow, I think we are using wrong traditional methods to market it. Festivals and sports events like marathons have a bigger marketing potential than even some TV adverts on foreign TVs or trade conventions. The recently held Rwenzori marathon had mostly local young corporates, and I assume it will grow bigger and attract more foreign runners. It is at this point that proper money will be coming in not only for the event, but for other activities beyond the event. No runner will pay for a flight ticket to just come and run, of course they will tour the country, spend money in our hotels, drink our coffee and tea, share pictures to their friends, family and followers for a week or so before flying back, this will bring in the most needed forex and exposure for our country.

I can apply the same logic for the Nyege Nyege festival. Although I disagree with most of the activities that happen there due to my strong Christian beliefs, I strongly believe they are doing their part in marketing Uganda. Maybe the churches should pick a leaf and organise a Christian festival, I have seen festivals such as Soul survivor or the Big church day out in the UK having more than 30,000 people attending. Why don’t we emulate such as we pride ourselves for being such a good Christian nation? There are Christians around the world looking for a place to go for clean fun and if Uganda prides itself in being a strong Christian nation, why not market itself with such events instead of spending a lot of energy criticising Nyege Nyege; provide the alternative and show the diversity and spirituality of Uganda. This will attract both foreign and local participants.

As seen by the Rwenzori marathon, Kasese and the neighbouring areas had a bumper harvest. This is now an annual event where I think most of the businessowners including the lowest man with a chapati stall or farmer in the village makes their biggest sales. This is the real BUBU (Buy Uganda Build Uganda). There are marathons in almost each City and town in the UK. Imagine each city or region had a festival or marathon celebrating something? It does not need to look like the Rwenzori Marathon, but events like the Kadodi festival or Bakiga nation etc are events which the ministry of tourism need to embrace, fund and promote. It is from such events that our cultural diversity is showcased and preserved, and this is important for the tourism of our nation.

To market and grow Uganda’s potential, we need to start thinking out of the box and ditch some of the traditional approaches. Rwanda has so far succeeded in that. We do not need to take our coffee beans to Europe. Bring Europe to Uganda and once they taste the coffee, they will take it willingly. The current generation decide more with their emotions to what they attach value to, there is more desire for personal experience more than generic things. This means, expensive tradeshows are good, but marketing Uganda closer to people’s hearts is the way to go. For example, Rwanda has understood football is a religion. Having billions of people watching every weekend seeing T-shirts shouting ‘’VISIT RWANDA’’ will surely make people visit Rwanda. These T-shirts are not only on footballers’ bodies, but to whoever buys the t-shirts and some other club merchandise, there is a free banner of visit Rwanda in people’s homes. This is way more effective, has a higher reach than some of the TV adverts our government pays for. Just to add, most traditional media is dying anyway. Imagine a country like Rwanda out muscling us in tourism despite the potential Uganda has?

In summary, we must understand that markets are changing. Ethical consumerism is the order of the day. This means, we are having less ‘Tourists’ and instead have more ‘Travellers’. Tourists generally want to escape life while travellers want to experience life. More and more people are opting for experience, and it is events and activities like this that will keep bringing them back to Uganda and experience Uganda. Research shows that people tend to attend festivals over and over and even turn them into traditions. This is evidenced with the Glastonbury festival in the UK or Burning Man festival in Nevada USA where I see colleagues and friends fight to get tickets which are hard to come by each year. I believe if we embrace this new approach, we shall drive our tourism to a new level and open up other economic activities and drivers for our government to generate revenue and taxes. To achieve this, the government needs to harness and support such activities. Uganda is home to the world marathon and 10,000m champions. Why don’t we use this star dust as comparative advantage for Kampala/Kapchorwa/Kasese to be the Marathon cities of the world? Uganda is having the biggest Christian revivals now, why not harness this economically as well to make it the Christian Festival destination of the world?

The writer works in Finance and is an International Development Practitioner and lives in Bristol, United Kingdom.