The Nabantu Foundation: A Strong force for Change for Bundibugyo

In Bundibugyo, a district tucked against the border of the Democratic Republic of Congo, there is a queen who hosts a very particular kind of gathering, and this time, URI Great Lakes gets to interact deeply. Around her table, the guests are not dignitaries or officials;they are girls who would otherwise have been married off before their eighteenth birthday, young men who once took up arms and now need a reason to put them down, and neighbours from communities that have spent decades in fear of one another. Her Royal Highness Nabantu Mbabazi Betty of the Obudhingiya Bwa Bwamba is not a figurehead. She is a force In parts of Bundibugyo, the birth of a daughter is greeted with a phrase that stops the Queen cold: “You have produced your sugar.” Or a cow. Or a bride price. The girl is celebrated not for who she might become, but for what she can be traded for. The Queen has heard this her whole life. And she has spent her adult life pushing back against it.

“Girls are not merchandise. They are the future.”

In 2024, she formalised that push-back into the Nabantu Foundation, a registered non-profit rooted in something that development programmes often overlook: culture itself. Rather than working against local traditions, the Queen works through them, using her own authority and her community’s deep respect for cultural leadership to shift what is considered normal. Early marriage, gender-based violence, the silence that follows trauma. These are not abstract problems here. They are daily realities, and the Queen meets them every day. Bundibugyo does not feature often in donor portfolios. It sits in what those who know it call a “development shadow” far from the capital, underfunded in health and education, and carrying wounds that go back generations. But to understand why this partnership matters, you have to understand Bundibugyo itself: The Rwenzururu rebellion, the attacks on Kanyamwirima Barracks in 2014 and 2015, and the November 2024 attacks. The long reach of the Allied Democratic Forces, who have used this border region as a corridor for infiltration and recruitment of fighters since 1997. These are not distant history. Many of the men who fought in these conflicts still live in Bundibugyo’s villages without work, without support, and without a structured path back into community life. There is also a fragility to daily relations here that those who know the district speak about honestly. Tensions between ethnic groups, between political factions, between neighbours, any of these can escalate quickly without structures for dialogue. The Queen understands this and it is why the Foundation’s work reaches well beyond girls’ education into peacebuilding, conflict transformation, and the rehabilitation of former combatants. She sees these issues not as separate programmes but as a single, connected effort to make her community safer for everyone who lives in it. The Foundation has already begun building the partnerships it needs. It has already opened its doors for partnership with United Religions initiative-Great Lakes (URI-GL), an interfaith and intercultural peace building organization whose maiden intervention on Preventing Extremism Through Advocacy, Resilience and Local Action (PEARL) is a great opportunity to pacify this region and signed up for membership with the Civil Society Coalition Against Violent Extremism (CISCAVE), for which URI Great Lakes serves as the National Convener. These relationships reflect a shared conviction: that peace in Bundibugyo cannot be imported. It must be grown from within, by leaders the community already trusts. The Queen is exactly that kind of leader. And she is asking for what good leaders ask for, not charity, but becoming the voice for the voiceless, building connections and capacity and joint programming. The chance to be part of a wider network of people who believe what she believes: that culture, used wisely, can heal what politics has broken. That former fighters deserve a path forward. That a girl born in Bundibugyo deserves the same future as a girl born anywhere else. If you have ever sat across the table from someone doing quietly extraordinary work in a place most people cannot find on a map, you understand why this story matters. The Queen of Bundibugyo is doing that work. We have the privilege of being part of what comes next. For URI Great Lakes, this partnership is a natural fit. We share a commitment to interfaith and intercultural dialogue, to the rehabilitation and reintegration of former violent extremist offenders, to protecting the girl child, and to the kind of community-level peacebuilding that outlasts any single programme or funding cycle. What the Queen is building in Bundibugyo is the kind of work we want to stand behind with.

Bundibugyo sits in what many call a development shadow. Our visit reminded us that shadows are also places where some of the most determined work happens, quietly, persistently, by people who do not wait for the spotlight to find them. We are glad we made the journey. We are glad we sat at the Queen’s table. And we are proud to be walking alongside the Nabantu Foundation as it builds something lasting in one of Uganda’s most overlooked corners.