Rhoda Kalema

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Rhoda Nakibuuka Nsibirwa Kalema (born May 10, 1929 in Kampala ) is a Ugandan politician . From June 1979 to May 1980 she was Minister of Culture and from 1989 to 1999 Minister of State . As the first elected Ugandan MP, she is considered the "mother of parliament ".

Life

Rhoda Nakibuuka Nsibirwa was born on May 10, 1929 in Kampala. She was the 13th of 25 children of Owekitiibwa Martin Luther Nsibirwa and grew up in Butikkiro on Mengo Hill . Her father served as Katikkiro (Prime Minister) of the Ugandan Kingdom of Buganda from 1929 to 1941 . After another appointment, her father was murdered outside Namirembe Cathedral in 1945 for advocating land sales for the expansion of Makerere College . Nsibirwa graduated from King's College Budo in Nsangi .

After training as a secretary, she worked as a secretary at Gayaza High School . In 1950, Nsibirwa married William W. Kalema . He was then a teacher at King's College, where she then taught typewriter and worked part-time as a secretary. When her husband received a scholarship from Edinburgh University , she completed a year-long social work course at Newbattle Abbey . She then graduated from Edinburgh University as well. Upon her return, she joined the Uganda Council of Women (UCW) and became a member of a committee.

With the independence of Uganda in October 1962, William Kalema became Minister of Labor and Post. Rhoda Kalema joined the Uganda People's Congress the year before . With the putsch of Idi Amins in 1971, their political activities ended. William Kalema disappeared without a trace in January 1972 and is one of the regime's numerous victims. His wife was forced into exile and worked as a farmer .

After the liberation war of 1979, Rhoda Kalema was elected to the transitional National Consultative Council (NCC) as the only and first woman in parliamentary history . In the short-lived government of Godfrey Binaisa , she became Minister of Culture that same year. A year later, Kalema was one of the founding members of the Uganda Patriotic Movement (UPM) party. In 1979, 1981 and 1983 she was arrested three times and for several months with other politicians.

From 1989 to 1999 Kalema was Minister of State for the Civil Service . She represented Kiboga District on the National Resistance Council (NRC) and in 1994 in the Constituent Assembly, which created the 1995 constitution. She won this election with two thirds of the vote against eight male competitors.

In the 1990s Kalema withdrew from active politics, but continued to work as a mentor for young politicians. One of her mentees, who then became MPs, was Ruth Nankabirwa , now Chief Government Whip of the Ugandan Cabinet .

Rhoda Kalema has three daughters and three sons, three of the children have already died. Kalema completed her autobiography at the age of ninety. - Your daughter, born in 1970Gladys Rhoda Kalema-Zikusoka is the first female veterinarian in her country to campaign for the protection of mountain gorillas and endangered species. In 2010 she was on the jury for the Rolex Entrepreneurship Prize .

Web link

Footnotes

  1. ↑ official residence of Katikkiros today Joint Clinical Research Center .
  2. ^ Daily Monitor: Rhoda Kalema @ 90: Still running and not weary. (English)
  3. ^ Mart Martin: The Almanac of Women and Minorities in World Politics . Westview Press Boulder, Colorado 2000. p. 392.
  4. ↑ The Independent: Gladys Zikusooka: Uganda's first vet doc for the wild . (English, August 5, 2016)
personal data
SURNAME Kalema, Rhoda
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Kalema, Rhoda Nakibuuka Nsibirwa (full name); Nsibirwa, Rhoda Nakibuuka (maiden name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Ugandan politician
DATE OF BIRTH May 10, 1929
PLACE OF BIRTH Kampala