Don’t just sit on it: 20pc of Uganda is water, but we still won't get off the pot

It is ironical that although a fifth of Uganda is water, fewer than a fifth of Ugandans know how to swim. ILLUSTRATION | JOHN NYAGA | NMG

Several African languages have a saying to the effect that you don’t realise the importance of the part of the body you sit on until you get a boil on it.

That part that you rarely respect constitutes about 20 per cent of your body mass.