As told by Egesa Ronald Leonard, an OB of SPENSA and former chaierperson SPENSA Old Students Association
The news arrived in the quiet, early hours of Sunday morning, delivered through the cold medium of a WhatsApp screen. The physical world stood still for a moment as I absorbed the passing of a titan: former Nsambya FC and Ugandan International footballer, renowned national sports administrator, and legendary headmaster, Mr. Raphael Bwire-Ouma.
It was a profoundly sad morning on Sunday. While words are often frail vessels for grief, I feel a deep obligation to share the measure of this great man through my own eyes – and, by extension, through the lived history of my family.
The Visionary of SPENSA: A Sanctuary for a Grieving Family
To understand Mr. Bwire’s legacy is to understand his unique ability to build institutions while simultaneously building people. Between 1975 and 1991, he had already established a stellar record of service as a teacher, sports master, and Deputy Headteacher at Old Kampala Senior Secondary School. But in 1992, the Ministry of Education & Sports tasked him with a new frontier: transforming St. Peter’s Boys Secondary School Nsambya.
At the time, the school was a little-known O-Level institution sharing infrastructure with its feeder primary school. Mr. Bwire’s impact was immediate and structural. He lobbied the government for graduate teachers, successfully introduced an A-Level section, and officially transformed the institution into St. Peter’s Senior Secondary School Nsambya (SPENSA), as we know it today. Furthermore, he meticulously separated the secondary and primary school estates and drew a firm, respectful line between school administration and the founding church – a display of governance that earned him the deep admiration of the then Auxiliary Bishop of Kampala, Rt. Rev. Mathias Sekamanya.
It was during this era of transformation that my family intersected with his leadership. The early 1990s were a crucible for my family. My father, the late Vincent Sande, lost his coffee export empire, Triple Bells Enterprises Ltd, returning from the UK to Kenya, and finally to Uganda with nothing. Following my father’s passing in 1994, the financial devastation forced some of my elder siblings out of school.
Our eldest sister, Nambudye Catherine (may her soul rest in peace), bore the weight of this new reality. Forced to leave the prestige of Tororo Girls’ School, she joined SPENSA in Senior Three in 1993. Under Mr. Bwire’s strict, disciplinarian stewardship, she thrived, eventually serving as Deputy Headgirl. Another of my siblings, Joseph Mangeni also passed through his hands between 1996 and 1998, bringing home stories of Mr. Bwire’s “tough love” – a leadership style that commanded profound reverence. He turned SPENSA into a football and baseball powerhouse, defending student and staff welfare so fiercely that his impending transfer in June 1998 triggered the first and only strike in the school’s history.
The Audacity of a Dreamer and a Leader’s Belief
That 1998 strike found me within the walls of SPENSA as a Senior One student – a reality that only materialized because of Mr. Bwire’s willingness to listen to an audacious young boy.
Earlier that year, I had topped the Molly and Paul schools in the Primary Leaving Examinations. Admission to my first choice, the prestigious St. Mary’s College Kisubi (SMACK), was in the bag. My sister Catherine was obsessed with sending me there, but I had different ambitions, cornering her into allowing me in day school. I feared boarding school would cost me my first-team slot in the Lukuli Hearts U-14 football team and bury my dreams of a sports career. At that age, I was convinced my destiny lay in football – as first choice, then priesthood as second choice, and then others would follow in that order.
In an act of youthful rebellion, I secretly wrote to the Headteacher of SPENSA – Mr. Bwire – asking for a bursary based on academic or sporting merit. I made a bold contractual promise: I will top my class to maintain the Board of Governors’ bursary.
I used our local Roman Catholic Sub-parish of Lukuli Konge as my return address. To my absolute shock, a reply arrived by the very next Sunday. Mr. Bwire had instructed his Deputy, Alice Nagimesi, to officially offer me a bursary. Armed with this leverage, I won the battle against my sister and joined SPENSA in Term Two. Though Mr. Bwire was transferred back to Old Kampala SSS just two weeks later, the foundation he laid – carried forward by his successor, Mrs. Theresa Obbo – allowed me to excel and top my class.
Destiny at the Gates of Old Kampala SSS
Nearly four years later, with top grades in hand and another SMACK admission letter in the bag, destiny intervened again. After rejecting SMACK a second time, I found myself wandering down Makerere Hill Road (now Gaddafi Road) seeking a place at Mengo Senior School. Lost and redirected by an old SPENSA peer, I walked through the gates of Old Kampala SSS.
There, standing at the gate, was Mr. Bwire. Seeing me with a khaki envelope, he asked what I wanted. I told him I needed a place in Senior Five. He reviewed my results with the practiced eye of a talent scout and simply asked, “PCB or PCM?” I replied, “PCM.” Right there at the gate, he instructed a Deputy to add my name to the pinned admission list and personally walked me to Mrs. Evelyn Amanziru Oketta’s office.
I promised him that I would be a national candidate. By the end of Senior Five, I had scored a minimum grade of 89% (in General Paper). Recognising my ambition, he challenged me in front of the entire senior five class, asking if I could maintain those grades. “Time will tell,” I replied. I took his public challenge as a declaration of war on mediocrity.
Iron, Grace, and the Birth of an Enterprise
Mr. Bwire did not just demand excellence; he provided the scaffolding to achieve it. In Senior Six, he singled out myself and the late Jackson Kashanku (who topped the Arts class) and offered us a room in the teachers’ quarters to eliminate the stress of commuting. He constantly challenged me to defeat Makerere College School in the UACE finals – a promise I am incredibly proud to have delivered on.
He trusted me enough to ask for my confidential reviews of teaching staff, and he even entrusted me with tutoring his own daughter, Faith, in Mathematics while she was at Nabisunsa Girls’ School. Yet, his grace never compromised his discipline. Once, in Senior Five, I arrived at school at 9:00 AM. He confiscated my bag and sent me home, ordering me to collect it from his office before 7:00 AM the next day. It was a swift, sharp lesson: brilliance is never an excuse for indiscipline.
On December 23, 2003, while awaiting my A-Level results, I visited his home with two cocks as a cultural token of profound gratitude. Elated by the preliminary reports of my national performance, he immediately offered me a job as a tutor at the school with the school library as my office.
But his greatest gift to me came in 2007. I had just founded Magezi Solutions and approached him with a proposal to digitise Old Kampala SSS’s operations. Despite my status as a self-taught software developer, he looked at me and said he trusted my word, my work ethic, and my ambition. He gave me the contract.
Upon deployment, that software was named Magezi Harvest. Today, that system is the namesake and foundation of the Magezi Harvest Group, a thriving enterprise handling strategy, technology, and execution across the region. He didn’t just educate me; he launched my business career.
A Legacy of Absolute Integrity
Mr. Bwire was a man of uncompromising principle. At Old Kampala SSS, the national examination body (UNEB) granted our centre special status simply because they knew Raphael Bwire-Ouma would unhesitatingly arrest his own students and hand them to the police for examination malpractice. He once personally dismantled a cartel of students forging bank stamps to steal school fees. He governed with a breathtaking, unique combination of unyielding strictness and profound grace.
The nation has lost a legendary educator, a sports icon, and a brilliant administrator. But I have lost a father figure, a mentor, and the man who gave me my first real shot at changing the world.
His physical journey has ended, but his legacy breathes heavily in the corridors of the schools he built, the sports he elevated, and the thousands of minds he sharpened – mine included.
Rest in eternal power, Mr. Raphael Bwire-Ouma. You ran your race with absolute distinction.