Margret Nazziwa is a Community Development Officer at Kira Municipality, close to Kampala, Uganda. She oversees the town’s social services and development initiatives, including community engagement programs and trainings that support and inform persons with disabilities about economic empowerment. She is also responsible for monitoring and evaluating social programs’ impact and works closely with other public officials to implement government initiatives locally.

Margret is a strong champion for inclusion in Uganda’s government, which she models through both her lived experience as a person with a disability and her leadership in public service. In addition to persons with disabilities, she also oversees community programs that support unemployed youth, at-risk children, and elderly individuals.

Project Idea

Margret will train individuals with disabilities to start their own businesses and become financially independent by pursuing Ugandan government grants for small entrepreneurs. She will create an inclusive small entrepreneurship program that will inform persons with disabilities about general business and self-management skills. Margret’s program will also train participants to become mentors for their peers so that persons with disabilities can play a bigger role in supporting the growth of small businesses through the community. She will also train local women and youth groups on how to create reasonable accommodations for persons with disabilities in self-employment programs that already exist.

Margret will start her project with a pilot group of 40 persons with disabilities in Central Uganda and will partner with 10 women and youth groups to develop reasonable accomodations trainings. She seeks to learn U.S. strategies that will help educate persons with disabilities about managing small businesses and creating inclusive work practices.

Left: Margret and her partners at a model inclusive small enterprise.

Right: A farming location in Uganda set up to model inclusive employment.