Nankwanga Eunice Kasirye

By Nankwanga Eunice Kasirye The Silent Struggles of an Unmarried Female Journalist in Afar, Ethiopia Rihana Abdela, 27, is a news anchor and reporter at the Afar Mass Media Agency in Ethiopia. In her four years of work, she has faced persistent marginalization and discrimination, both within her newsroom and from the wider society. She explains that women in Ethiopia are often second-guessed, and for female journalists, the skepticism is even deeper. Society views women as less capable, and this results in discriminatory assignments, missed opportunities, and exclusion from key decisions. Rihana’s situation is compounded by her marital status. At 27, she is unmarried-considered a cultural misfit in a community where girls are expected to marry as early as 16. Instead, she devotes herself to caring for her ailing parents. Yet this choice leaves her underpaid, overlooked, and constantly subjected to stigma. In Afar culture, marriage is seen as a woman’s shield. A husband is believe...

By Nankwanga Eunice Kasirye what kind of society do we want to be-one that breeds cruelty, or one that  nurtures peace? Compassion and empathy are not just virtues; they are the foundation of peaceful co-existence and a humane society. When one person chooses to show compassion, it spreads, touching others, inspiring them to carry it forward, and creating a ripple effect of humanity. Sadly, the reverse is equally true: when violence is accepted, tolerated, or even celebrated, it quickly spreads until it defines an entire community. A disturbing video circulating from Busoga, eastern Uganda, captures this dark reality. In it, a woman is seen assaulting a man with a sugarcane. Instead of intervening to stop the fight, the crowd cheers for retaliation. The man pins the woman down, strikes her with a stone on the head, and continues beating her with a stick as the crowd applauds. Even as the woman tries to escape-weak and disoriented-people, especially men, encourage the man to chase h...

By Nankwanga Eunice Kasirye  Sexual Harassment, Unpaid Work, and Denied Maternity Leave: The Silent Burden of Female Journalists in Upcountry Newsrooms in Uganda This is the story of Susan Achola, a Ugandan radio journalist whose career exposes the grim reality of sexual harassment, denial of maternity leave, exploitation, and unpaid labour in the country’s media industry. Susan Achola, in one of the Radio studios in Lira When you switch on your radio to catch the morning news, you rarely think about the voice behind the microphone, her struggles, her sacrifices, or the silent battles she is forced to fight. For many female journalists in Uganda, the studio is not just a workplace- it is a battlefield. Behind the powerful words they use to defend the rights of others lies a haunting irony—they themselves are denied their own rights. When Susan got her first newsroom job at a leading radio station in Lira City, she was excited. But her dream soon collided with the harsh realitie...

  By Nankwanga Eunice Kasirye To be a mother is to surrender your original self and live entirely for others. The moment God chooses you to co-create life, your rebirth begins…not once, but as many times as the lives you deliver. With each child, a woman’s old version fades... desires, dreams, her name…leaving only what is needed for the survival of the new. Motherhood begins by losing. You lose your body to pregnancy, your cravings to nausea, your comfort to gaining or losing weight, and your rest to anxiety. You lose the luxury of self, because every breath, every bite, every plan begins to revolve around protecting someone else. But it doesn’t stop at birth. You deliver the baby into the world regardless of the pain, the bleeding, the fear. And just when the world celebrates a new life, the mother begins a new journey of quiet sacrifice. Breastfeeding, nursing, calming cries in the night, and surrendering her voice for the sake of peace. She compromises. She tolerates. She a...

  I Married a Ritualist: Joy’s Survival from a Scam Disguised as Love By Nankwanga Eunice Kasirye  Just like any other young girl fresh from college, Joy (pseudo ) was vibrant, ambitious, and full of dreams. With her journalism diploma in hand, she had a mental checklist of what life should look like next: a good job, a loving husband, children, and a beautiful family. She knew exactly the kind of man she wanted—professional, respectable, someone she would d proudly introduce to her parents Joy is the firstborn in her family, raised by Buganda cultured parents who believed deeply in marriage and all the traditions that came with it. So when she landed a job at a media house straight out of school, her life felt like it was falling perfectly into place. Amidst the busy life of a young journalist chasing stories, she held tightly to her dream of finding the right man. Then she met him . A tall, well-groomed, soft-spoken man—a medical doctor. The perfect picture of the ma...

By Nankwanga Eunice Kasirye Breaking the Blade:  Spotlight on Beatrice Chelan g at A SEED PLANTED IN THE HILLS   In 1976, deep in the mist-veiled hills of the Sabiny region in Eastern Uganda — where the mountains huddle together like ancient, brooding elders — a young girl named Beatrice Chelangat first heard whispers of female circumcision. It was a Sunday morning, and the air smelled of damp earth and wood smoke. Millet fields bowed gently to the wind, and children’s laughter floated faintly between the ridges. Inside the small Anglican Church — a modest building of sunbaked bricks and timber, worn smooth by the hands of generations — the villagers had gathered, their bare feet dusting the earthen floor. The archdeacon, a towering man in a heavy black robe, stood before the congregation. His voice, usually firm and commanding, trembled with something raw that morning — a wound too fresh to hide. Tears clung stubbornly to the corners of his eyes as he confessed: his own ...

T he Unseen Struggles Of Uganda’s Female Journalists During The COVID-19 Lockdown By Nankwanga Eunice Kasirye Being a journalist in Uganda is already complex,for female journalists, especially freelancers, the challenges multiply. When the COVID-19 pandemic triggered a nationwide lockdown in 2020, the cracks in Uganda’s media industry widened—revealing the harsh realities of gender inequality, economic uncertainty and policy-driven exclusion. As the world turned to media for timely updates, facts, and survival information, Uganda’s female journalists found themselves at the margins of both the newsroom and society. This piece, part of the Defending the Defenders series, documents the lived experiences of five Ugandan women journalists. Their voices expose how a global health emergency deepened existing inequalities in the media industry. The movement permit Crisis: Who Gets to Tell the Story? Uganda’s COVID-19 lockdown included a total suspension of public transport and non-es...