New Internationalist

Betty Bigombe

Born into a poor community in 1950s Uganda, the eighth of eleven children, Betty Bigombe seemed to be destined to a life of carrying water and fetching wood. But her talent as a natural ‘problem solver’ was spotted while she was still at school. At that time, she says, ‘You finished education; the next thing was to get married, be a good housewife.’ However, she was determined to continue her studies, getting to and graduating from Harvard Kennedy School, the public-policy wing of Harvard University, in 1979.

During her time in the US she did not lose sight of what was going on back home – which in early 1980s Uganda was a civil war against the rule of

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