Lake Bunyonyi - the School Journey.

On the evening of August 10, a student of about 17 stepped out a boat at a landing site in the Bufuka area of Mwendo Parish, Kitumba Sub-county. Slinging his school bag like a soldier a rifle on his shoulder, the Senior Three student appeared hesistant to speak about the incident of the last weekend. "Yes, I heard of it," he said of Roland Ampeire, a Senior One student of Lake Bunyonyi Community Vocational Secondary School in Kabale District who had drowned while swimming with a friend in Lake Bunyonyi. "I think it was just his day, a bad day. I heard he was learning to swim and that is something we all had to do for survival but it's better I don't talk about this because even tomorrow morning I will be back on the water," he added On mornings when the mist still hangs over the hills surrounding Lake Bunyonyi, children begin making their way towards the water with school bags on their backs and uniforms neatly tucked in. For those living on the islands, the journey to class does not begin with a walk to a roadside or a wait for a school bus. It begins at the landing site, where a wooden canoe becomes the only available means of transport to the other side. The distance may be as little as 500 metres or as much as 1.5 kilometres depending on where a child starts the journey, but regardless of the distance, the final stretch to school is across open water whose conditions can change before the learner reaches the opposite shore. This is the daily reality for communities scattered around Lake Bunyonyi in southwestern Uganda, where the water is at once a source of livelihood, a tourist attraction and the main transport network connecting people to schools, health facilities, gardens and markets. The lake, shared by communities in Kabale and Rubanda districts and dotted with about 29 islands, is celebrated for its spectacular scenery and is commonly described by local communities as the second deepest lake in Africa. Several records put Lake Bunyonyi's maximum depth at about 39 to 40 metres, making it a particularly unforgiving environment for anyone who falls into the water without adequate protection or the ability to swim. For the communities that live on its islands, avoiding the lake is not a realistic safety measure because there is often no practical alternative. The same canoe that carries a farmer to a garden or a trader to the market may carry children to school in the morning and return them home in the evening. It can be used to take a sick person towards medical care or transport food and other supplies between the islands and mainland. In that sense, the canoe is much more than a boat; it is the equivalent of the taxi, school bus, ambulance and a boda boda (commuter motorcycle) on which an entire community depends. The problem is that many of these vessels are small dugout canoes, some poorly constructed and others carrying more people or goods than they were designed to handle. The danger becomes particularly pronounced for learners because their exposure is repetitive. A child living on an island may cross the lake twice a day throughout the school term, often in a vessel operated by an adult whose boat may not have been inspected, licensed or equipped with enough life jackets. At Bwama Primary School, previous reports have put the number of pupils who depend on lake transport at hundreds, while Lake Bunyonyi Secondary School has also reported learners travelling by canoe and being affected by inadequate transport. At least 400 children could be taking to the lake on a typical school day simply to attend classes at schools serving island communities. The problem is not new. In 2021, Lions Clubs distributed 500 life jackets to seven schools and communities around Lake Bunyonyi in an effort to improve the safety of children who crossed the lake to attend school. The beneficiary schools included Bwama Primary School, Bwama Secondary School, Bufuka Primary School, Little Angels Nursery and Primary School, Good Life Community Primary School, Kifuka Primary School and Kyabahinga Primary School. At the time, the intervention was welcomed as an important step because school authorities said inadequate transport was contributing to lateness, absenteeism and, in some cases, learners missing school when the weather became difficult. Yet the intervention did not remove the underlying problem. The children still have to cross the lake, and the number of reported drownings over the years shows that the risks have continued. Among the most recent victims was Roland Ampeire, a Senior One student of Lake Bunyonyi Community Vocational Secondary School. Ampeire, the son of James Tayebwa of Kashenyi Village in Butenfa Parish, Rubaya Sub-county, was reportedly swimming with a friend in the Bufuka area around midday when he drowned. Tayebwa said the school management informed him about the incident after Ampeire's friend returned and reported what had happened. According to the father, his son had been using a closed jerrycan as a floating aid while learning to swim, but the improvised device slipped from his hands and he lost his balance. For Tayebwa, the tragedy raised questions about how a boarding student was able to leave the school and reach the lake without the knowledge or supervision of school authorities. "Parents entrust schools with the safety and welfare of their children. Proper supervision could have prevented this incident," he said. The circumstances surrounding Ampeire's death are different from those of children who drown while crossing the lake in canoes, but they point to the same broader vulnerability: children who live and study around Lake Bunyonyi interact with water almost constantly, yet many do not possess the swimming and water-survival skills needed to protect themselves when something goes wrong. In some cases, they enter the water deliberately to bathe or swim; in others, they are passengers in canoes that can capsize without warning. The common factor is that the water is part of their daily environment while the safety systems around it remain inadequate. Richard Okullu, Assistant Commissioner of Police and Deputy Commander of the Marine Police, says the activities taking place around Lake Bunyonyi are so varied that the risks cannot be addressed through one intervention. "Water transport is the most common activity, but communities also use the lake and its surroundings for farming, subsistence fishing, tourism, cultural activities and access to schools, churches, mosques and markets," he says. "Each activity creates different points of exposure, with children among those most vulnerable because of their limited ability to assess danger and survive once they fall into deep water." Police records sampled by Okullu show four incidents reported to the Marine Police in July and August 2026. On August 9, a Senior One student identified as Ronald from Lake Bunyonyi Secondary School drowned after leaving school to wash clothes and bathe in the lake. Police were informed and responded, but by the time officers reached the scene, the student had already drowned and the body was subsequently retrieved. On August 18, a 15-year-old juvenile identified as Mukiza drowned after going to bathe while grazing animals near the lake. In another incident, five juveniles entered the water in a dugout canoe which capsized, leaving one child dead and four others rescued. The fourth incident involved Musamba Primary School headteacher Johnson Tumukunde, who drowned on July 26 after the canoe he was travelling in capsized in the middle of the lake. Tumukunde's death provides perhaps the clearest illustration of how quickly an ordinary journey can become fatal. According to Rebecca Ndamwesiga, the 20-year-old woman who was helping him cross the lake, she had gone to fetch water when she met the headteacher, who asked her to transport him by canoe to church. They set off in a dugout canoe, but strong winds struck while they were in the middle of the lake. The weather became difficult to navigate, the canoe filled with water and eventually overturned, throwing both occupants into the lake. "When we were travelling on the lake, strong winds hit and I could not see very well. Our canoe filled with water and capsized. We ended up scattered in different directions of the lake," Ndamwesiga said. She spent nearly three hours in the water before residents rescued her and took her to a nearby health centre. Tumukunde was not so fortunate. His body was recovered several days later, leaving behind a tragedy that has since become part of the growing list of deaths associated with the lake. Ndamwesiga says the experience left her traumatised and fearful of travelling on Lake Bunyonyi, but she believes the outcome might have been different if she had been wearing a life jacket. "The government should help us with equipment like life jackets. I believe that if I had a life jacket, I would not have drowned," she said. Her experience is particularly relevant to the debate over the safety of learners because a child caught in the same circumstances would have even fewer options. A strong adult swimmer may be able to remain afloat for some time, attract the attention of rescuers or reach a floating object, while a child who cannot swim may disappear beneath the surface within minutes. This is why water-safety specialists argue that life jackets, safer boats and rescue services must be combined with basic swimming and survival skills rather than treated as separate interventions. Mr Otto Businge, a research associate at the Centre for Injury Prevention and Trauma at Makerere University School of Public Health, says communities living around water bodies can become particularly vulnerable because their dependence on the same resource that threatens them makes exposure unavoidable. At Lake Bunyonyi, he says, the use of dugout canoes creates an additional risk because the boats are small, unstable and easily affected by waves, particularly when passengers exceed their intended capacity. "If you visit these water sources, look at the types of boats people are using," Businge says. "They use dugout canoes, which are made from logs by carving out the inside. These are the vessels they use for transport. When waves come, they are already at risk because the boats are small and overloaded." Overloading, according to Marine Police, is one of the persistent problems on the lake. A canoe designed for only a few passengers may be loaded with several people as well as charcoal, agricultural produce, school bags or other goods. "The additional weight reduces stability and leaves less room for the boat to withstand waves. When combined with strong winds, an already unstable vessel can quickly take on water or overturn," Okullu says. Ronald Asiimwe, a resident around the lake, says strong winds are particularly dangerous between June and September. "Between June and September, the winds are very strong. The lake becomes dangerous, but we have no other means of transport," he says. Such is the dilemma confronting parents whose children cross the lake. For an island family, simply instructing a child not to use the water when conditions are dangerous may mean keeping the child away from school. A parent may decide that the risk is too great on one morning, but repeated absences can leave a learner behind academically. In communities where the lake is the only practical transport route, safety therefore competes directly with access to education. Lois Birungi, a parent from Buwama Island, described the dilemma as a matter of having to choose between two risks. "We know the lake is dangerous, especially when the wind becomes strong, but our children have to go to school. If we keep them at home every time the weather changes, they will not study. So when the child leaves, we can only tell them to be careful and pray that the canoe reaches the other side safely." Birungi said there were not enough schools on the island so those who cannot get admission here look to the mainland. Buwama Island has government-aided primary and secondary school. That resignation is not necessarily evidence that parents do not care about their children's safety. Rather, it reflects how little control many families have over the circumstances of the journey. They cannot determine the condition of the canoe, they cannot control the wind and they often cannot afford a safer motorised boat. They can only decide whether their child will make the journey. Festus Musinguzi, a mainland peasant farmer who regularly crosses the lake to make ends meet, expressed a similar concern, saying the family has become accustomed to the routine despite knowing what can go wrong. "It is the same for my child going to school, too. When my child leaves home, I know the lake is there, but I cannot follow him every day," Musinguzi says. "We cannot afford another means of transport, so I tell him to sit properly, avoid standing in the canoe and listen to the person operating it. After that, we can only wait for him to return." Such resignation has been building over years of repeated accidents. The documented incidents include the August 2023 drowning of Senior Two student Martin Izabayo after a canoe he was paddling with another student capsized while travelling towards Harutinda Market. In August 2024, five-year-old Immaculate Atuheire drowned after a canoe she was playing in capsized near Kavumu shores, while 11-year-old Ronald Asiimwe drowned after a canoe he and his brother were using while grazing goats capsized. On August 4 that year, 14-year-old Ignatius Akandiinda, a Senior One student of Lake Bunyonyi Secondary School, drowned after the small canoe he was using while returning from cutting grass capsized. In September 2025, Bruce Ainepurani, a 24-year-old Senior Four student, and Dickson Kabagambe, a 42-year-old school cook, drowned after their canoe overturned near Punishment Island - named so for old practice of abandoning women with no husband at the island - while travelling from Bwama Island to Burimba. Earlier in 2025, two women were reported missing after another canoe accident in which three people were rescued, while in March 2024 a canoe carrying five people was caught in heavy rain and strong winds, resulting in deaths and prolonged searches for missing passengers. In April 2026, Joyous Ampurire and her two-year-old daughter, Witness Akansasira, died after a canoe carrying them and two men overturned at about 8:30pm while they were returning from a burial. Residents said the passengers were not wearing life jackets. The pattern extends further back. In June 2018, five people drowned while crossing the lake to cultivate. Among them were Agnes Turyasingura and her nine-month-old baby Jacob Niwahereza, Patience Akampurira and her eight-month-old baby Shivani Ainembabazi, as well as Macklin Tumuhekyi. These cases demonstrate why the lake's drowning problem should not be treated simply as a series of unfortunate accidents. They point to recurring vulnerabilities: unstable vessels, strong winds, lack of life jackets, inadequate swimming skills, weak enforcement, limited emergency response and the absence of reliable alternatives for communities that depend on water transport. Unfortunately, in Uganda, where about 3,000 people die from drowning every year - according to estimates cited by Makerere University School of Public Health and Uganda Marine Police - drowning is still not a public health issue. Police report continues to categorise it as an incident. Marine Police says another problem is the failure by some users to consider weather conditions before setting off. "People often continue with planned journeys despite heavy rain, strong winds or large waves because they have already decided to attend a social event, visit relatives, go to a garden, attend prayers or travel to a market," he says, citing the political season when the volume of movement across the lake can increase. For schoolchildren, weather decisions are often even further removed from their control. A learner may leave home when the lake is calm and only encounter worsening conditions on the return journey. The school timetable does not change simply because the wind has strengthened, and the child may have no means of determining whether it is safe to begin the journey home. Marine Police also warns against the use of gumboots in the water. Although they may be common among farmers and people working around the lake, the boots can make it more difficult for someone to remain afloat after falling into the water. The police also point to the absence of life rings and first-aid equipment on some boats, meaning that even when a person is rescued alive, the lack of immediate medical assistance can worsen the outcome. The problem is compounded by weak enforcement. Okullu says some boats operating on Lake Bunyonyi are not licensed or inspected by the Ministry of Works and Transport, while some operators attempt to evade Marine Police patrols. "When officers arrive at a landing site," he says, "some operators abandon their boats and disappear, only returning after the officers have left." "It becomes a game of trying to avoid enforcement instead of complying with the regulations." Even life-jacket enforcement can become difficult because some passengers wear the equipment only when officers are present and remove it afterwards. Others put the jacket on incorrectly simply to create the appearance of compliance. Okullu says Marine Police begins with sensitisation before moving to enforcement, but the effectiveness of the exercise depends on cooperation from communities, boat operators and local leaders. The Police also faces a practical limitation: it cannot be everywhere at once. Kigezi Region Police spokesperson Nelson Tumushime says the force is concerned about the number of drowning incidents and has been engaging communities on water safety, but acknowledges that marine response remains limited because of shortages of personnel and resources. "We are sensitising communities, but our marine response is still limited due to lack of enough personnel and resources on the lake," Tumushime says. Okullu says Marine Police has one detachment on Lake Bunyonyi with personnel and boat teams, but response time depends on where officers are stationed and how quickly an accident is reported. If a victim is not wearing a life jacket and cannot swim, even a short delay can become critical. "On water, every minute matters," he says. For Businge, this is why emergency response must become a permanent part of water transport planning rather than something that is mobilised only after a tragedy. If roads can have ambulances because authorities recognise that crashes require rapid intervention, he argues, water transport should have an equivalent system for people travelling on lakes. "We have ambulances on the roads, which are a means of transport. Why not have similar emergency response arrangements on water?" he asks. He also argues that Uganda needs better drowning data. While Police and local authorities record individual incidents, the country does not have a sufficiently comprehensive system that captures all drowning deaths, their causes and locations. Businge says unpublished research specific to Lake Bunyonyi indicates that at least 40 to 50 people may die on the lake, although that figure has not yet been published and should not be treated as an official count. The absence of reliable data creates an accountability problem because policymakers cannot easily determine the scale of the crisis, identify the most dangerous landing sites or measure whether interventions such as life-jacket distributions and sensitisation campaigns are reducing deaths. Uganda has put in place laws, institutions and programmes intended to prevent drowning and improve safety on inland waters, but the persistence of deaths on Lake Bunyonyi raises questions about how effectively those measures are reaching communities whose daily lives depend on small, often poorly regulated boats. The Ministry of Works and Transport's Maritime Administration is mandated to formulate policies, laws and strategies for inland-waterway safety; inspect, register and license vessels; enforce maritime regulations; coordinate search and rescue; investigate marine incidents; and conduct public safety campaigns. Uganda has the Inland Water Transport Act, 2021, and the government has been developing regulations covering vessel registration and licensing, vessel construction standards and safety management of small vessels. Government reporting previously acknowledged inadequate inland-water-transport safety and said draft regulations were being developed. More importantly for your 2026 Bunyonyi story, the Ministry of Works and Transport issued a public notice on August 21, 2026, specifically addressing compliance with inland-water-transport safety measures and the mandatory use of life jackets. The Ministry's 2026-2030 strategic plan includes strengthening water-transport safety, including vessel inspection, registration and licensing, search-and-rescue arrangements and safety campaigns. Globally, the World Health Organisation estimates that about 300,000 people die from drowning every year, with children and young people carrying a disproportionate burden. More than 90 per cent of drowning deaths occur in low- and middle-income countries, where daily exposure to rivers, lakes, wells and other water sources is often unavoidable. WHO says children aged five to 14 are among the groups for whom drowning remains one of the leading causes of death. The WHO's 2026 World Drowning Prevention Day campaign, under the theme "Unite to Turn the Tide", calls for coordinated action across sectors. Its PROTECT framework highlights safer physical infrastructure, rescue and resuscitation capability, occupational safety, safer water transport, basic swimming and water-safety education, child safeguarding and preparedness for floods and other emergencies. For Lake Bunyonyi, these global recommendations translate into very local needs. There is the need for properly constructed and inspected boats, enforceable passenger limits and competent operators. There is a need for sufficient life jackets and life rings, and for passengers to use them correctly rather than merely wearing them when they see a Police patrol. There is a need for trained community rescuers who can respond before Marine Police arrives, and for first-aid facilities capable of treating people who survive initial immersion. There is also a need to teach children basic swimming and survival skills without encouraging them to enter the lake unnecessarily. Okullu says Marine Police is working with the Ministry of Internal Affairs under a drowning-prevention programme and coordinates with the Ministry of Works and Transport, the Ministry of Health, the Ministry of Education and Sports, the Office of the Prime Minister and the Ministry of Water and Environment. Civil society organisations also contribute life-saving equipment and training, while local leaders and communities are expected to support enforcement and awareness. But the responsibility for keeping children safe cannot rest with Marine Police alone. "Schools serving island communities must know where their learners are, particularly where boarding students are concerned," Okullu says. "Parents need to be equipped with practical safety information. Boat operators need to understand that the passenger in their canoe may be a child whose life depends entirely on their decisions. "Local leaders must support enforcement rather than treating safety requirements as an inconvenience, while government agencies need to ensure that regulations are backed by enough personnel, boats and equipment to make them meaningful." Julius Mucunguzi, the Electoral Commission's head of corporate affairs and communication, recalls in his book "Once Upon A Time - The Story of Keeping Hope Alive" that when he was a student at Lake Bunyonyi Secondary School on Bwama Island, learning to swim was treated as a necessary part of growing up around the lake. "We had to learn to swim because it was a form of preparing ourselves in case the lake got rough during the many times we crossed it." Motorised boats are generally stronger and more capable of navigating rough conditions than the small dugout canoes commonly used by ordinary residents, but their cost places them beyond the reach of many families. Engine-powered transport is often perceived as a service for people who can afford to pay more, leaving poorer residents dependent on the cheapest vessels even when conditions become dangerous. This creates a form of inequality on the water. A visitor staying at a lakeside hotel may board a stronger motorised boat with safety equipment, while a child from an island community may cross the same lake in a hollowed-out log because that is what the family can afford. For the child, the lake does not distinguish between a tourist and a pupil. The difference lies in the resources available to each person before something goes wrong. And something does go wrong. Ndamwesiga knows that better than most. She survived nearly three hours in the water after the canoe carrying her and Tumukunde overturned, but the experience changed the way she looks at the lake. She now fears travelling on the same water that once formed an ordinary part of her routine. For hundreds of learners, however, the routine continues. Every morning, children still walk towards the landing sites carrying the books they need for lessons. They still climb into canoes, sometimes alongside adults travelling to markets, gardens or neighbouring villages. They still cross the same water that has carried generations of island residents and claimed the lives of children, parents, teachers and other community members. A safer future for these children will therefore not come from asking them to avoid Lake Bunyonyi altogether. Their schools are on the islands, their homes are on the islands and their communities depend on the water. The realistic solution is to make the journey itself safer through properly regulated boats, adequate life jackets, competent operators, weather warnings, emergency rescue capacity, first-aid services and swimming and water-safety education. For a parent watching a child climb into a canoe in the morning, education remains the reason for making the journey, while fear remains the companion that travels with them. The child leaves because school cannot wait; the parent watches because the lake cannot be ignored. When the canoe eventually disappears towards the opposite shore, all that remains is the hope that the same child will return in the evening, school bag still on the back and feet safely on dry land. For Lake Bunyonyi's island communities, that should not have to be an act of faith. It should be a journey the country has made safe.