There is one pride-inducing utterance that generations of Ugandans have worked so hard to live up to. In 1907, British Winston Churchill named Uganda: ‘the pearl of Africa’. But from one generation to another, since then, his pearl of Africa seems like a dream for contemporary Uganda.
Today, Uganda’s narrative is largely dominated by contraband news and information. And that’s why a group of creatives named Kafunda Kreative are behind an ambitious campaign to tell the real story as happening on the ground. The campaign dubbed #Koikoiug is about Ugandans being proud of their country and showcasing the true picture of what actually happens.
What is #koikoiug and what is the inspiration behind it?
#koikoiug is a campaign, a space, a platform where Ugandan stories can be and are going to be told. In this phase of the campaign, we aim to create Uganda’s first crowdsourced ad. An ad literally done by you-gandans. We aim to curate one million photos about Uganda over the next 10 weeks. At the end of the 10 weeks, these photos will be used to create a series of ads about this country.
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The point of the #koikoiug campaign is to break stereotypes and transform mindsets both at home and abroad. At home, a lot of us are resigned towards our country. Abroad, we have all heard the stories; they think Idi Amin is still president; they think we live side by side with wild animals et al. You laugh, but it’s actually true. A lot of people don’t even know where Uganda, or what we are about.. This campaign aims to show them what Uganda is about.
One million pictures in 10 weeks seems like too big a challenge, how did you arrive at such a number?
Someone told me if a dream isn’t big enough it isn’t worth dreaming. So for starters one million photos is a big dream. But if the first few days is anything to go by, by the time of this interview, we were above 150 pictures in two days, and that’s because we are doing this together. So together one million photos isn’t a lot. As to how we arrived at the number, well, we wanted to dream as big as possible.
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I understand there was an #koikoiinstawalk on Sunday (September 13). Does that mean that the campaign will mostly be limited to Kampala and its outskirts?
The campaign is not limited to Kampala and its outskirts. The Instawalk was a springboard for the entire campaign. And since the majority of Instagrammers are in Kampala, it is a good ground zero. Over the next 10 weeks there going to be a variety of themes, for example this week it’s #myhood. We have people from out of Kampala representing where they stay. We shall have themes like Innovations, Nightlife, Proudly East African spanning over the 10 weeks. A new theme every week. So it’s not limited to Kampala, we want to capture as much of Uganda as we can, but that takes Ugandans from around the country plugging in too.
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Who is invited to participate; amateur or hobbyist creatives or it’s more inclined to the pros, who, with such finesse capture the details an ordinary would miss?
Every Ugandan is invited. If you have a camera [or smartphone camera], you can be a part of #koikoiug. We are looking the Ugandan story from a Ugandans perspective, every Ugandan. #koikoiug is every Ugandan’s story.
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What social media platforms will the campaign be running on?
The campaign will run on Instagram and by extension on Facebook. However it will be cutting across all other social media platforms for other parts of the campaign like conversations on different things during the challenge and various activities.
The campaign officially kicked off on 11th September and will run for 10 weeks.
Follow them on Instagram @kafundakreative
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