The Ugandan government has announced plans to send all Senior Six vacists to the National Leadership Institute (NALI) in Kyankwanzi for about six months of patriotism and ideological training.
The National Secretariat for Patriotism Corps (NSPC) Commissioner, Hellen Seku, said the programme is expected to begin this year and that the plan had been agreed upon with President Yoweri Museveni.
“I can assure you, head teacher, we are going to begin this year. So, this year we agreed with Jaaja (President Museveni) that all Senior Six vacists are going to Kyankwanzi. You’re going to go for about six months,” Seku said.
She made the announcement at Immaculate Heart Girls’ Secondary School Nyakibale in Rukungiri District, where more than 1,700 students from four institutions had completed a week-long patriotism training programme.
The government says the broader programme is intended to promote discipline, patriotism, national identity and responsibility among young people.
Training conducted under the programme includes ideological and patriotism sessions, national identity, political history, Pan-Africanism, citizenship, discipline, integrity and entrepreneurship. Students have also taken part in drills and parades.
Seku also said school patrons and coordinators, together with teachers and head teachers who have never undergone the training or have not participated in it for a long period, will be required to take refresher courses.
“All patrons and coordinators are going to do a refresher course, including teachers and head teachers who have not yet trained, even those who have taken long. We want everybody to undergo the training,” she said.
The planned Senior Six programme represents an expansion of patriotism training that has previously been conducted for selected students and other groups at Kyankwanzi.
A head teacher who attended the Rukungiri event, Gadgar Kibayo Arinitwe of Makobore High School, recalled undergoing a similar programme after completing Senior Six in 1993. He said the values he acquired during the training continued to influence him years later.
The latest announcement has also raised questions about how the programme will be implemented for the large number of students completing Senior Six across Uganda. Reports indicate that details such as the precise reporting schedule, organisation into cohorts and how the programme will fit around university and tertiary admission schedules have not yet been fully explained.
For now, the NSPC says the six-month Kyankwanzi programme is set to begin with this year’s Senior Six vacists, extending the government’s patriotism and ideological training programme to an entire cohort of school leavers.