Communities for Development is a small charity that operates in Eastern Uganda, Bulambuli. It provides the training and support entrepreneurs in rural Uganda need to develop or save businesses and to build thriving communities. Their aim is to enable the rural community of Bulambuli to reach financial independence and build their own future.

In 2020, the charity needed to raise funds to keep their activity going, and also to bring awareness to this very much unknown part of the world: Bulambuli, Uganda.

A Kanye-level rap music video, done as a 100% Ugandan production – ditching the sadvertising and turning the traditional charity campaigning on its head.

We knew we needed to seem bigger than our size, since we are a small NGO. Without that no one would ever hear about Bulambuli.

We began with a research on charity campaigning – then aimed to create a different and unique tone of voice for our campaign. One with humour, even sarcasm.

It’s common knowledge all around the world that “money makes money”: the rich are getting richer by investing in each other's ventures, while they ignore smaller, poor entrepreneurs. That's why people from Bulambuli, a small rural community in Eastern Uganda, who needed urgent investments, decided to hijack this well known truth by pretending to be filthy rich – and portraying it in a true rap star way on a music video.

A Kanye-level rap music video, done as a 100% Ugandan production.

The music video was directed and produced by Wakaliwood Studios, the B-Movie Uganda based film studio. The original song was created by Ugandan rap artists: Mc Yallah, Big Ben and Jora Mc, some of whom also come from the Bulambuli region, singing in English, Luganda and Lugisu, the local dialect of Bulambuli.

We also created remixes with artists from all around the world (Berlin,Tokyo, L.A, Amsterdam, San Francisco), bespoke short social media videos which we tweeted to successful entrepreneurs from around the world, an online store selling ‘authentic’ 100% fake video props to boost donations and additional content pieces. We released each part of the campaign with a dedicated press release to amplify its effect.

This was maybe the worst year ever to create awareness and get funding for small charities that are not operating in the health sector. Yet our results were very positive and helped Communities for Development to keep operating in the area for two more years and raise over $25,000 money that will help more than 200 families receive formations and grow their business. This way the local community of Bulambuli is one step closer to fighting poverty and to reaching financial independence.

The campaign has gained awareness from all around the world, being featured in several news outlets including BBC News, The Guardian, Vice, El País, and many more.