Oxfam Executive Director, Winnie Byanyima has Monday downplayed calls for her to compete for Uganda’s highest office.
She spoke out for the first time on reports that she could be prompted to lead the Eastern African landlocked nation.
Winnie who happens to be wife to Uganda opposition kingpin, Kizza Besigye told Steven Sucker in an interview on the BBC’s Hard Talk on Monday morning that she is focusing on her job at Oxfam when he asked her to respond to reports that some people view her as presidential material come 2021.
“It would be an honor to be asked to lead my country but right now i have an even bigger honor serving Oxfam. I am happy, i have just signed an extension to my contract for the next five years,” Winnie said.
Winnie, a former lawmaker in the Ugandan parliament also spoke about the controversial move by government to scrap the presidential age limit.
“It is not a partisan issue but a citizen’s issue. It is an Oxfam issue so its important that i speak so that Ugandans can rise up and challenge it,” Winnie said.
She also spoke about the charity organisation’s plans to move the Oxfam International Secretariat from Oxford, where it was founded, to Nairobi, Kenya.
The aid organisation will begin its move in 2017, with it expected to take two years to complete the move, it was announced mid this year.
It will begin the move by first relocating senior directs and other key Secretariat staff. It will then recruit locally. As is the case now, its Secretariat will remain a multi-locational organisation, with advocacy offices in DC, NY, Brussels and Addis Ababa, a Global Humanitarian Team, and other staff accommodated in our affiliate HQs and country teams, too.
(Additional reporting by BusinessFocus)
