KAMPALA: Makerere University in Uganda has lost another top scientist in a space of less than a week to the deadly COVID-19.
Dr. Godfrey Mwesige, 43, was a lecturer at the College of Engineering Design and Art.
“We have lost Eng. Dr. Godfrey Mwesige, a lecturer in CEDAT to COVID-19,” a friend mourned in a WhatsApp group. He was a highways expert.
Dr. Mwesige was known as an accomplished highways expert in the country.
“Mwesige’s PhD was Sida funded and frankly treated us to the most articulate PhD defences ever held at Mak in living memory,” a former colleague mourned.
Another one added:
“Colleagues from CEDAT can testify here but using my research administrator’s lense, I found Godfrey an extremely intelligent person. His proposed highway models juxtaposed with the USA and Scandinavia road systems shall for ever remain alive to my memory. His seismic presentations during our annual science days will last for generations… RIP Godfrey.”
The community at CEDAT and the Uganda Engineers Registration Board were left speechless.
A few weeks before hospitalization, he was preparing to submit his application for promotion to Senior Lecturer. He was one of the promising academicians in the Department of Construction Economics and Management.
Sources say when he got the sickness, colleagues were hopeful that he would recover soon since he was a young man with no record of health complications. Indeed he showed steady progress towards recovery.
“We begun to loose hope mid last week when it was reported that the damage to his lungs was 70% and materials to handle him in that condition were almost out of stock in Uganda. God has chosen to take him. May his soul Rest In Peace,” another colleague mourned him late this evening.
Dr Mwesige’s death has left the Univesity in shock following the death of Dr Banada from the College of Agriculture and Environmental Sciences last week. He was 46 and an accomplished academician with 120 publications to his name who won the coveted Golden Award from Pope Francis granted by the Pontifical Academy of Sciences!