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A week to Christmas, Lira City Woman MP Dr. Jane Ruth Aceng parted with roughtly 20m to create a lasting memory in the minds of at least 45 Catechists from Ngetta Catholic Parish, which is one of the Catholic parishes located in her constituency. Ngetta is unique in that it’s the largest and most prominent of all Catholic parishes in her constituency.
It all started in August this very year when the team leader, a Catechist called Daniel, approached Aceng and explained the desire among fellow Catechists to make a pilgrimage to Kampala and tour some of the key historical sites relating to the history of the Catholic Church, Catholicism and are located in Kampala.
Charitable as always, Aceng responded with enthusiasm and promised full support to make this pilgrimage dream come true. She saw this as an opportunity to increase exposure of the individual Catechists to modern things in Kampala while deepening their Catholic faith.
From the very onset, Aceng suggested that the individual Catechists demonstrate commitment by each raising Ugx100,000 which would go towards the collective transport cost to Kampala and back home after the pilgrimage.
But financial difficulties, afflicting much of rural Ugandans upcountry, made this hard to the extent that some of the Catechists took forever to put together their Ugx100,000. And so, D-day finally came just last week.
Led by Fr. Constantine, ably aided by Catechist Daniel, the 45 Catechists travelled to Kampala; some of them for the first time in their life time which was a dream come true.
Some of the pilgrimage sites they visited once in Kampala included:Our Lady of Africa under Mbuya parish, Munyonyo Martyrs Shrine, Namugongo Martyrs Shrine, Kiwamirembe Marian Shrine, Kigungu landing site (site on lake Victoria where pioneer Catholic missionaries Fr. Lourdel and Br. Amanns landed for the first time in Uganda on 17th February 1879) and the legendary Rubaga Cathedral.
The other sites the influential Lira City Catechists visited were Munyonyo Convention Center; Parliament of Uganda and even sat in plenary and Entebbe International Airport.
For some of these visits, which kept the peoples clerics away effectively for 6 days, Dr. Aceng had to personally join and accompany the Catechists afterall these were essentially her guests.
While in Kampala, Aceng booked for them nice hotels for their accommodation where her assistants ensured there was enough for each one of them to eat and drink. She also ensured they slept in decent hotel accommodation so as to create a lasting memory. They each resided in a self-contained hotel unit and this made the whole experience even better.
Having used the Coasters from Lira University, which she got for them and met the entire cost, Aceng pulled off another surprise when she publicly refunded the Ugx4.5m the Catechists had collected among themselves to cater for the transport requirement.
This was declared as the Catechists prepared to board the Coaster back to Lira City. The Minister declared this refund at the time none of her guests was expecting it. Hence it was a pleasant surprise.
Aceng ensured that the refunded Ugx4.5m was split and distributed back to the Catechists each of whom got back his Ugx100,000 they had been fundraising for months preceding their highly consequential trip to Kampala. She explained that retaining their Ugx4.5m was unnecessary now that the Coasters she hired from Lira University did bring them to Kampala and back home in Lira on the 6th day of the trip.
In total, Minister Aceng (to whom the Lira Catholic Church leadership is eternally grateful) had to part with roughly Shs15m to ensure the well-being of the Catechists who gratefully slept, ate and drunk very well.
On return back home in Lira City, the Catechists became instant celebrities as their parishioners reflected on the nice photos and videos they took and kept sending back home via WhatsApp as they visited different pilgrimage sites in Kampala.
The Langis son Milton Obote was an excellent legislator in the Legco and much of his political story started at what became the Parliamentary Buildings of Uganda where the Catechists seemed to be most excited to be as Aceng took them around to many different places and aspects of Parliament including the public gallery section.
To ensure that all the relevant photos and videos were well taken and appropriately processed; Dr. Aceng facilitated Qfm journalist Kenny Okello who she enabled to travel with the group of enchanted Catholic Catechists from Ngetta Parish.
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