Uganda Renaissance was something of a one-man magazine. This little-known political periodical, published in Cairo between 1958 and 1961, was largely the initiative of its founder and editor John Kalekezi, or Kale. An activist in his 20s from the Kisoro district of western Uganda, Kale was responsible for most of the dense articles and energetic opinion pieces on African anti-colonial struggles that greeted Renaissance readers. These pieces formed a conversation between subjects discussed in Cairo during the city’s heyday as a radical Afro-Asian hub and Kale’s own experiences of colonialism from his home near Uganda’s border with present-day Rwanda, as well as during his student days in Kampala… read more
The man behind ‘Uganda Renaissance’