Noerine Kaleeba is a Ugandan physiotherapist, educator and AIDS activist. She is the co-founder of the AIDS activism group "The AIDS Support Organization" (TASO). She is currently a program development adviser for the Joint United Nations Programme on HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS). She is also the Patron of TASO.
Women in Uganda have substantial economic and social responsibilities throughout Uganda's many traditional societies. Ugandan women come from a range of economic and educational backgrounds. Despite economic and social progress throughout the country, domestic violence and sexual assault remain prevalent issues in Uganda. Illiteracy is directly correlated to increased level of domestic violence. This is mainly because household members can not make proper decisions that directly affect their future plans. Government reports suggest rising levels of domestic violence toward women that are directly attributable to poverty.
Rwanda faces a generalized epidemic, with an HIV prevalence rate of 3.1 percent among adults ages 15 to 49. The prevalence rate has remained relatively stable, with an overall decline since the late 1990s, partly due to improved HIV surveillance methodology. In general, HIV prevalence is higher in urban areas than in rural areas, and women are at higher risk of HIV infection than men. Young women ages 15 to 24 are twice as likely to be infected with HIV as young men in the same age group. Populations at higher risk of HIV infection include people in prostitution and men attending clinics for sexually transmitted infections.
Rose Kabuye is a retired Lieutenant Colonel in the Rwandan Army and Until late 2023, she was the highest ranking woman ever to serve in her country's armed forces. She is currently working in the private sector as chief executive officer of Virunga Logistics and Startech Limited but is best known for her work as a fighter for the Rwandan Patriotic Front during the Rwandan Civil War. She subsequently became Mayor of Kigali City, Rwandan Chief of State Protocol, and a member of the Rwandan parliament. Because of her participation in the liberation struggle, she was awarded The Rwandan National Liberation Medal and the Campaign Against Genocide Medal. She was serving as the chief of protocol of Rwandan President Paul Kagame in November 2008 when she was arrested in Frankfurt, Germany on charges that were lifted in March 2009.
Geeta Rao Gupta is a leader on gender, women's issues, and HIV/AIDS who is serving as United States Ambassador-at-Large for Global Women's Issues since May 2023. She previously served as executive director of the 3D Program for Girls and Women and senior fellow at the United Nations Foundation since 2017. She is frequently consulted on issues related to AIDS prevention and women's vulnerability to HIV and is an advocate for women's economic and social empowerment to fight disease, poverty and hunger.
Africa Humanitarian Action (AHA) is a non-governmental organization that provides relief services to countries in Africa. It was founded by Dr. David Zawde in 1994 in response to the Rwandan genocide.
The Rwanda women's national football team represents Rwanda in women's association football and is controlled by the Rwandese Association Football Federation. It had to date been scheduled to compete in one major tournament, the inaugural Women's Challenge Cup held in Zanzibar in October 2007, but the event was ultimately canceled. It has finally debuted in February 2014 against Kenya. The team is nicknamed The She-Amavubi.
During the Rwandan genocide of 1994, over the course of 100 days, up to half a million women and children were raped, sexually mutilated, or murdered. The International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR) handed down the first conviction for the use of rape as a weapon of war during the civil conflict, and, because the intent of the mass violence against Rwandan women and children was to destroy, in whole or in part, a particular ethnic group, it was the first time that mass rape during wartime was found to be an act of genocidal rape.
In Rwanda, sport is supported by the government's Sports Development Policy of October 2012. This argues that sport has a number of benefits, including bringing people together, improving national pride and unity, and improving health. The policy identifies challenges to the development of sport in the country, including limited infrastructure and financial capacity. It sets the "inspirational target" that, by 2020, Rwanda should have "a higher percentage of population playing sport than in any other African nation" and be ranked amongst the top three African countries in basketball, volleyball, cycling, athletics and Paralympic sports, and the top ten in football. It also aims to "foster increased participation of people in traditional sports". According to research published by the University of the Western Cape's Interdisciplinary Centre of Excellence for Sport Science and Development, the most popular sports in Rwanda are association football, volleyball, basketball, athletics and Paralympic sports.
Pregaluxmi "Pregs" Govender is a South African human rights activist, author, and politician.
Prudence Nobantu Mabele was a South African activist who advocated for the rights of women and children living with HIV/AIDS, and against gender-based violence. She was diagnosed with HIV/AIDS in 1990 and went public with her status in 1992. She set up the Positive Women's Network in 1996. She worked with UNAIDS and also qualified as a sangoma. She was the recipient of many awards, including the Felipa de Souza award in 1999. In 2004, she carried the Olympic flame. She died in 2017 and in her memory the International AIDS Society set up an annual prize for gender activists.
Ingando camps are Rwandan political and civic reeducation and indoctrination camps. These camps were created by the ruling party of Rwanda, the Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF). Ingando camp participants are required to wear military uniforms, live together and participate in shared activities.
Beatrice Allen is the vice president of the Gambia National Olympic Committee since 2009 and a member of the International Olympic Committee starting in 2006. She has served as vice president of the World Baseball Softball Confederation (WBSC), one of the biggest international sports federations, since 2017.
Else Trangbæk was a Danish gymnast. She competed in five events at the 1968 Summer Olympics. After her retirement from active gymnastics – with 26 national titles between 1964 and 1970 – she continued her education she became a university professor for sports history and a sports administrator.
Mabel Bianco is an Argentine physician who has devoted her career to fighting for women's access to improved health services and sex education. In 1989, she established the Foundation for Studies and Research on Women, and has continued to serve as its president. She has been an activist in Latin America and the world, introducing policies addressing breast cancer, HIV/AIDS, reproductive rights and gender reform in the UN.
Kereyn Maree Smith is a New Zealand sports administrator. She was the chief executive and secretary general of the New Zealand Olympic Committee (NZOC) from January 2011 to December 2021. She has also held several other roles in sports administration.
Fulata Lusungu Mbano Moyo is a Malawian systematic and feminist theologian who is an advocate for gender justice. Moyo has written over twenty-eight journal articles.
Fatuma Ndangiza is a women's rights advocate, policy expert, and politician. As of January 2024, she is serving her second term as a Rwandan member of the East African Legislative Assembly. Born and raised in a refugee camp in Uganda, she returned to Rwanda during the civil war. Initially she settled in Byumba and led the SOS Ramira initiative to assist women and children in acquiring basic supplies and treatment to meet their needs. When the Rwandan Patriotic Front took control of Kigali, she moved to the capital and began working in the Ministry for Women and Family Promotion to provide support and relief to survivors and victims of the Rwandan genocide. She helped to create the National Women's Council and its regional and local frameworks to empower women to help them achieve political and economic parity through legal change and advocacy. She worked with the women's ministry until 2002.
Oda Gasinzigwa is a Rwandan civil servant and politician. Born in Tanzania as a refugee, she was educated at the Institute of Development Management in Mzumbe and then worked for eight years at the National Bank of Commerce in Dar es Salaam. When the Rwandan genocide ended in 1994, she moved to Kigali and worked with various ministries to improve women's economic and leadership.
Litha Musyimi-Ogana is a Kenyan, who has worked as an international civil servant and development advisor for many years. Since 2022, she has been an elected member of the African Commission on Human and Peoples' Rights, chairing the committees responsible for Indigenous people and people living with HIV. She organised the Women's Peace Train, which traveled from Kampala, Uganda to Johannesburg, South Africa to advocate for ending conflict and bringing stability for women and children in Africa for the Earth Summit 2002. From 2007 to 2015, she was the director of the African Union Commission's department of Women, Gender and Development. In 2013, she was recognised by Malawian President Joyce Banda as one of the distinguished women of Africa in a ceremony which was part of the decennial celebrations of the African Union's Maputo Protocol and in 2020 she was honoured with the African Women of Excellence Award by the African Union's Diaspora African Forum.
