By KT Reporter
One of Professor Lawrence Mukiibi’s children who is deeply involved in the running of St Lawrence University SLAU recently escalated feuding with their neighbor Pastor Robert Kayanja when he sold three acres of the adjacent University land at the Mengo campus to someone else yet the flamboyant man of God had for years been interested in buying the same land.
Kayanja, a belligerent neighbor since the days when even Prof Mukiibi was still alive, is expansionist and had always looked forward to the day when the Mukiibi children would wish to sell some of the land. He always readied himself for that day so that he buys the land and use it to expand his Rubaga Miracle Center Church premises and operational space.
But when time came, Mukiibi’s son, who is choking on University/SLAU-related debts including unpaid staff salary arrears, didn’t consider Pastor Kayanja because they have always considered him to be a hostile and unfriendly neighbor. For example, the University almost lost some of the students years ago when Kayanja, whose church they shared an access road with, introduced rigorous security checks which ended up inconveniencing students and other stakeholders coming to the University.
Soldiers would line up all guests coming through that shared road, including those going to the University SLAU, and check them thoroughly. Students and parents resented this and some of them considered abandoning SLAU. Mukiibi was still alive and this forced him to invest billions of shillings to change the University’s main gate and construct a new access road of more than 1km.
All this only complicated the relationship which continued not to be very excellent until Mukiibi’s death in 2016. There was also concern that worshippers at Kayanja’s church would pray loudly, the way all born again Christians do, and make learning and the conducting of lectures hard at the nearby SLAU. Pleas for the noise to be regulated always fell on deaf ears as Mukiibi’s group was always seen as interfering with freedom of worship of thousands of people at Kayanja’s church.
So, recently when Mukiibi’s son desired to sell, bad neighbor Pastor Kayanja was kept in the dark and only got to know about it after the Shs3bn transaction fees had already been paid and the title transfers effected. This has only widened the mistrust between Kayanja and people running what remains of Mukiibi’s St. Lawrence University next door. 
But the larger problem is that the son who sold didn’t sufficiently consult all the Mukiibi siblings, which has created more chaos and misunderstandings among the Mukiibi estate beneficiaries. An auntie called Namakula is equally unhappy, just like some of the widows Mukiibi left behind.
Among the few lecturers who remain at SLAU, the decision to sell caused more anger. “He got 3bn and we expected him to prioritize paying our salary arrears but instead he just disappeared yet there are many other debts including those of URA, NSSF and for utilities like NWSC and Umeme. We don’t know what the future of this University is going to look like,” said one of the disgruntled SLAU lecturers who made it clear that many of them have taken more than 8 months without their monthly salary being paid.
The new owner of the land is planning to put up apartments and commercial buildings because this is a prime location under Kampala’s Rubaga division. There are also fears that this same Mukiibi son may be tempted to sell more of the University land once the 3bn gets finished. This chaos is erupting at the time when the University is struggling to get at least a charter from NCHE whose bosses have been very reluctant to grant the same.
The Vice president J Alupo and NRM secretary general Rose Namayanja have been working hard to help SLAU University to get the charter but this latest chaos is likely to demoralize and frustrate them since such public officials don’t like to associate with such scandalous situations. Give us feedback on this story through our email: kamwokyatimes@gmail.com.
