From the whispers in Karuzika Palace to the whispers in your family group chat — why your betrayal will never come from your enemy
By Mukama Phillip Kahigiriza mukphix@gmail.com
I have failed to sleep since that week; the memories and the wounds are still so fresh.
I keep seeing that video. A shaky TikTok voice, no face, no name, no source from Karuzika, no word from the clan elders, just a caption in bold red letters: “MUKAMA OYO IS DEAD.” And then the forwards started. WhatsApp groups lit up like dry grass. Boda stages in Fort Portal. Market women in Kyegegwa. Students and influencers in Kampala. Everyone sharing death before confirming life.
And then the palace had to do the most painful thing — to come out and prove that their King is alive. “The Mukama is alive and well.” Imagine having to prove that you are not dead.
But by the time the palace spoke, the real secret was already out. The King did not die. What died was loyalty.
Because before the grave was even dug, before the body was even seen, before tears were even real, people had already started sharing his throne.
I read the comments with a heavy heart.
“Who is next now?”
“Which prince is more senior?”
“Which mother has more say in the palace?”
“Which politician from Kampala is already funding which side?”
Men who were kneeling before the throne on Monday, with their foreheads on the ground saying “Mukama Wange,” were the same men measuring the chair on Tuesday. The same elders who are supposed to guard the kingdom like the old gatekeepers turned into brokers. The same advisors who are supposed to protect the King turned into auctioneers, quietly calling bidders in the dark.
That is when it stopped being a Tooro story for me. It became my story. Your story. Our daily story.
Our literary mother, the late Hon. Mary Karooro Okurut, who we just buried a few months ago, wrote it all those years ago in her novel The Invisible Weevil. She said, “The weevil eats from inside where no one can see it.” She was writing about Uganda. She was writing about corruption. But she was writing about Tooro that week. The weevil eating Tooro is not coming from outside Buganda or Bunyoro or Kampala. It is inside. It is the guard who has become the thief. It is the hand you trusted to hold the palace door, now using that same hand to sell the key.
And Okot p’Bitek, that great Acholi poet, warned us in Song of Lawino. He said, “The power of a chief is like a fire. All who come near it want to warm themselves, but many get burnt.” Everyone wants the warmth of the throne, but no one wants to carry the cold nights that come with it. Everyone wants to be called King, but no one wants to carry the burden of being King when the kingdom is sick.
And then my mind went straight to Gethsemane.
Because we like to blame Rome for killing Jesus. We say it was Pilate. It was the soldiers. It was the nails. But Rome was just the knife. The hand that placed Jesus in the hands of Rome was not Roman at all. It was Jewish. It was one of the twelve. It was family.
Judas Iscariot was not an outsider. He was the treasurer. He carried the money bag. He ate from the same plate as Jesus. He was supposed to be the one to rescue the ministry when things got hard. He was supposed to be the one to say, “No, you cannot arrest my Master.” But he is the one who walked into the garden and said, “The one I kiss is the man.”
Think about that kiss. It was not a slap. It was a kiss. Betrayal does not come with a slap. It comes with a kiss. With a hug. With “my brother.” With “my sister.”
Jesus was not betrayed by His haters. He was betrayed by His helper.
Isn’t that exactly what happened in Fort Portal? Tooro was not shaken by people who hate Tooro culture. It was shaken by people who wrap themselves in the Tooro flag and say they love the kingdom most.
Jennifer Nansubuga Makumbi, perhaps the finest novelist Uganda has produced in this generation, wrote a line in Kintu that I have never forgotten. She said, “A home is first destroyed by those who live inside it, not by those outside.” The people closest to the throne are the ones who know exactly where to place the knife. They know the price.
Now, my friend, remove Tooro. Remove the palace. Remove King Oyo. And put your own name on that throne. Because your own life is a small kingdom.
Your family is a small kingdom. Your marriage is a small kingdom. Your workplace is a small kingdom. And the same story is playing there.
Who hurt you most? Be honest. Was it a stranger on the street in Nairobi or Kampala? No.
It was the cousin you helped get a job in town, who now wants to take your father’s plot in the village.
It was the workmate you introduced to your boss with a good heart, who now writes secret reports to make you look like a thief so that she can take your position.
It was your own brother, your blood, who was supposed to keep the family together after mzee died, but he was the first to bring a buyer for the family land when the grave was still fresh and your mother’s tears had not even dried.
I have seen it with my own eyes. When you fall sick, some people in your family don’t pray for healing. They start calculating your property. “If he dies, who will take the car? Who will take the land in Nansana?” When your marriage gets a small problem, they don’t counsel you. They wait to take your place. They say “we are praying for you” but they are preparing to marry your husband.
Goretti Kyomuhendo, one of our great daughters of literature, said it so simply: “We have learnt to hug each other while searching each other’s pockets.” That is who we have become. We shout “Long live the King” loudly in public, but in our hearts we are whispering, “When will this King die so that I can be King?”
We are living in a generation of Judas kisses. Holy kisses on Sunday, betrayal on Monday.
But here is the part that broke me and healed me at the same time. Look at what Christ did.
Even when He knew – He knew fully, 100% – that Judas would betray Him, He still washed his feet on the night of the Last Supper. He still dipped bread and gave it to him. He still called him “Friend” in the garden. “Friend, why have you come?”
He did not stop being King because someone wanted His throne. He did not stop being God because someone sold Him for thirty pieces of silver.
And that is why Tooro will survive this shameful week. Not because people will stop gossiping. People will always gossip. Tooro will survive because kingship is not in that chair in Karuzika Palace. It is not in the TikTok comments. It is in the blood. It is in the anointing. It is in God. Oyo was given that throne when he was a three-year-old boy in 1995, a child who could not even tie his own shoes. It was God who put him there through the clans. No WhatsApp forward can take what God gave.
As Okello Oculi wrote in his powerful novel Orphan, “The crown may be shaken, but the head that was anointed to wear it does not fall.” The crown shook in Tooro last week, yes. But the head that was anointed to wear it is still alive.
So let me leave you with two questions tonight, practical questions.
One, if you are the one being betrayed today – if your family is sharing your land while you are still breathing, if your friends are celebrating your downfall, if your own church is gossiping about you – please do not become bitter. Bitter will kill you faster than betrayal. Cry if you must. The palace in Fort Portal is crying. Jesus Himself cried in Gethsemane until His sweat became like blood. But after you cry, stand up and remember this: the throne remains. God remains. Your destiny was not given to you by your cousin. It was given by God.
Two, if you are the one scrambling for someone’s place before they are even buried – if you are measuring your brother’s land while he is still on oxygen in the hospital, if you are applying for your friend’s job while he is still being investigated, if you are waiting for your sister’s marriage to break so you can enter – pause. Just pause tonight and ask yourself this painful question: Am I now Judas? Is this silver really worth my soul?
Judas got thirty pieces of silver. He bought a small field with it. But that field is still called the Field of Blood. He got the money, but he lost his life. He lost his name forever.
Those who are scrambling for a throne that is not even empty may get the position. But they will lose their honour. And honour, once lost, never returns.
As Mary Karooro Okurut, our mother, wrote in her last great novel The Official Wife, “Power without conscience is the most naked form of betrayal.”
May God heal Tooro.
May God heal our families that have become small palaces where everyone wants to be King.
The King lives. Christ lives. And truth, even when it is betrayed, kissed, and sold, always resurrects on the third day.
