From Turkey To Türkiye:  Uganda Should Also Reclaim Entebe And Lubaga?

UgandaToday: From Turkey To Türkiye:  Uganda Should Also Reclaim Entebe And Lubaga?

The 2022 Türkiye Decision Offers Uganda A Thought-Provoking Lesson On Language, Identity And The Power To Name Places Correctly

When a country decides to reclaim the way its name is written and recognised internationally, it is more than a question of spelling.

It can be a statement about identity.

That is the significance of Türkiye’s decision in 2022 to formally ask the international community to stop using “Turkey” as the country’s official English name and instead use “Türkiye”.

The question now arises: Could Uganda similarly look back at some of the names inherited from the colonial period and ask whether they accurately reflect the languages, cultures and historical identities from which those names originated?

Two names provide an interesting starting point — Entebbe and Lubaga, the latter commonly written officially and historically as Rubaga.

But unlike Türkiye, where the sovereign state itself formally requested the international name change, Uganda’s situation involves historical place names, local-language orthography and competing established usages. The evidence therefore calls for a conversation rather than a simple declaration.

Türkiye: A Country Reclaims Its Own Name

On June 1, 2022, Türkiye’s Foreign Minister Mevlüt Çavuşoğlu formally wrote to United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres requesting that the country’s name be used as “Türkiye” rather than “Turkey” in UN affairs.

The United Nations confirmed the change on June 3, 2022.

The UN records the official name change as effective in May 2022 and now lists the country as the Republic of Türkiye. (The United Nations in Türkiye)

The move followed a wider campaign by the Turkish government to promote the country’s own preferred form of its name internationally. Turkish officials had already been encouraging the use of “Türkiye” in international communications and branding before the formal UN request. (Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Türkiye)

One practical problem with “Turkey” was also its ambiguity in English: the word is the common English name of a bird. The Turkish government’s campaign therefore sought to reinforce the country’s distinctive national identity and the name used by Turks themselves.

The important point, however, is that Türkiye did not merely ask foreigners to pronounce its name differently. The state formally asserted its preferred official name in international diplomacy.

That distinction matters when comparing the Turkish experience with Uganda’s place names.

What About Entebbe?

The story of Entebbe is particularly fascinating because the name is deeply rooted in Luganda.

Several Ugandan historical accounts trace the name to ntebe, meaning a seat or chair.

Uganda Wildlife Conservation Education Centre says Entebbe derives its name from the Luganda word meaning “seat” and connects the name to the place where a Buganda chief traditionally sat to administer justice. (UWCE Centre)

New Vision similarly records the tradition that Entebbe derives from ntebe, referring to the seat of a chief (Head of the Mamba clan) who exercised judicial authority in the area. (New Vision)

The historical explanation goes further.

According to accounts of Buganda’s Mamba clan traditions, the area was associated with “Entebbe za Mugula” — the seats of Mugula, referring to the traditional authority exercised there.

It is therefore understandable why some Ugandans question whether the modern English spelling Entebbe fully reflects the original Luganda form.

But Is “Entebe” Definitely The Correct Replacement?

This is where the historical and linguistic evidence requires caution.

An older Luganda grammar specifically notes that the place name Entebbe should be “Ntebe” or “e Ntebe.” (Scribd)

Modern Luganda orthography also recognises that the difference between single and doubled consonants can be linguistically meaningful. A double consonant can represent a stronger or lengthened consonant, rather than simply being an arbitrary spelling variation. (Wikisource)

Therefore, it is categorical to say that colonial officials simply invented the second “b” and that Entebe is unquestionably the only authentic Luganda spelling.

What can legitimately be asked, however, is whether Uganda has ever undertaken a sufficiently authoritative linguistic and historical review of the spelling of Entebbe, and whether the spelling used on government documents, maps, road signs and international databases should be reassessed from the standpoint of Ugandan languages and history.

That is a conversation worth having.

Lubaga: A Stronger Case For Reclaiming The “L”

The case of Lubaga is somewhat different.

The hill and area commonly known as Rubaga are widely associated with the Luganda name Lubaga.

New Vision has reported that the name Lubaga is associated with the Luganda word okubaga, relating to planning or strengthening a structure during construction. It also reports the long-standing account that early White Fathers had difficulty pronouncing the name with “L” and consequently used “R”, resulting in “Rubaga”. (New Vision)

Other historical accounts likewise state that early missionaries pronounced Lubaga as Rubaga.

The Kampala Archdiocese itself provides the historical background to the Catholic establishment at the hill, although the Church continues to use “Rubaga” prominently in the name of its cathedral and in its historical records. (Kampala Archdiocese)

This creates an intriguing linguistic legacy.

A name rooted in the local language became widely known internationally through a pronunciation associated with the early missionary period.

The Colonial Map And The Local Tongue

This is not unique to Uganda.

Across Africa, European administrators, missionaries, explorers and cartographers frequently recorded African names according to the sounds, spelling conventions and alphabets familiar to them.

Sometimes the resulting spellings became permanent.

Once a name appeared on administrative documents, maps, missionary records, postal documents and later government records, it acquired an official life of its own.

Generations later, people can end up assuming that the inherited spelling was always the original spelling.

That is precisely why the Türkiye example is interesting.

The Turkish government demonstrated that a country can decide that the form of its name used internationally should reflect the name it chooses for itself.

From “Rubaga” Back To “Lubaga”?

If Uganda were to undertake a similar exercise, Lubaga would arguably be an obvious candidate for linguistic review.

There is already evidence that “Lubaga” remains a recognised form of the name. Modern geographical databases list Lubaga with Rubaga as an alternative name, while recent Ugandan writing has increasingly used “Lubaga” in historical and linguistic contexts. (Mindat)

The issue becomes particularly interesting because Kampala itself contains numerous names whose origins are unmistakably indigenous.

If Ugandans accept the principle that indigenous names should be preserved and written as accurately as possible, then the country could consider whether Lubaga should become the preferred geographical spelling, while retaining “Rubaga” where it forms part of the historically established name of institutions such as St Mary’s Cathedral Rubaga.

That would allow history to be respected without preventing linguistic correction.

The Türkiye Lesson For Uganda

There is an important lesson here — but it is not that Uganda should simply copy Türkiye.

Türkiye’s name change was a sovereign decision by the Turkish state, communicated formally to the United Nations.

Uganda’s place names are more complicated.

They involve local languages, historical usage, colonial records, government institutions, maps, postal systems, cultural institutions and established public usage.

A serious Ugandan review would therefore need to involve:

• Luganda language scholars;
• historians;
• cultural institutions;
• the Buganda Kingdom;
• the Uganda National Council for Science and Technology and relevant language institutions;
• the Uganda Bureau of Statistics;
• the Ministry responsible for local government;
• cartographers and geographical-name authorities;
• and affected local communities.

Such a process could establish which spellings are historically authentic, linguistically correct and appropriate for official use.

It Is About More Than Letters

Names are repositories of history.

When a community calls a place by a particular name, that name may contain memories of kings, chiefs, traditional institutions, geographical features, occupations, beliefs or events that occurred centuries ago.

Changing a spelling can therefore be much more significant than correcting a typographical error.

It can amount to restoring a piece of cultural memory.

Türkiye’s decision demonstrates that countries have the capacity to tell the international community: “This is how we call ourselves; please recognise us accordingly.”

Uganda could ask a related question:

“Are some of the names by which the world knows our towns, hills and communities actually written the way our own languages and histories intended?”

A Call For A Ugandan Name Audit

Rather than immediately ordering every signpost in the country to be changed, Uganda could begin with a National Indigenous Place-Names Review.

The exercise could examine major towns, hills, lakes, rivers, counties, cultural sites and historical landmarks whose names were written or modified during the colonial period.

Each name could be investigated through oral history, archival material, indigenous-language dictionaries, historical maps and modern linguistic scholarship.

Where an indigenous spelling has strong historical and linguistic support, that spelling could progressively become the preferred official form.

In the case of Lubaga, the discussion could be straightforward:

Lubaga or Rubaga?

In the case of Entebbe, the debate should be more scholarly:

Entebbe, Entebe, or Ntebe?

The evidence does not justify pretending that the answer is already settled.

And perhaps that is precisely why the discussion is necessary.

Uganda Can Respect Both History And Heritage

There is no need to erase colonial history.

The colonial spelling itself is part of Uganda’s history.

But preserving history does not necessarily mean preserving every colonial convention forever.

Uganda can acknowledge that Europeans played a role in recording and popularising certain spellings while simultaneously allowing Ugandan scholars and cultural institutions to determine whether those spellings accurately represent indigenous languages.

The Türkiye experience therefore provides Uganda with an interesting mirror.

Turkey became Türkiye because the country formally asked the world to recognise the name it chose for itself.

Uganda need not copy that process.

But Uganda can learn from the principle behind it:

A people’s identity should not permanently depend on how outsiders once heard, pronounced or wrote their names.

Perhaps it is time for Uganda to look again at the names on its maps, signposts, government documents and international records — and ask whether they tell the story in the voices of the people whose ancestors gave those places their names.

Editorial Note

The discussion over Entebbe/Entebe/Ntebe should not be presented as a settled linguistic fact. Historical sources differ, and a proper determination would require specialist review of Luganda orthography, archival records and oral history. The case for reviewing Lubaga/Rubaga is better documented, particularly regarding the historical explanation for the missionary-era “R” spelling.

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