By Ian Ortega
Few people even know that the President has a sister. In times where everyone tries to hinge up even the slightest connection they have to the President, a one doctor, Violet Froerich Kajubiri chooses to keep her connections to the President very silent. She’s that sister to the president that no one ever talks about and 99% of Ugandans have no idea she exists.
Yet she’s not a lady of small achievements. The well-educated Kajubiri has lived out most of her life in Europe and it is here that she plies her trade. Her only closest connection to State House is the fact that her son, Dr.Joseph Ekwau is the presidential advisor on veterinary issues.
But why would a woman, so closely connected to the President by birth choose to keep a low profile? Isn’t it rather surprising seeing that even a long distance cousin to a maid who works in State House would try to shove such a fact down someone’s throats? Dr. Kajubiri is so unlike those who want to prove that they know the president more than others. She hasn’t been mentioned in any scandal neither does she have any controversy on her profile. Mention clean and you are bound to mention Dr.Kajubiri in the same sentence.
Dr. Kajubiri is married to a German man; this could explain why Uganda is not her normal pastime area. Her other cast into the spotlight came from the Runyankore Proverbs she used to write in the Orumuri Newspaper every week under the title; “Enfumu ya wiiki.” All the proverbs she wrote here were copyrighted under VKF 2010 and the years that followed afterwards, thus today, when someone uses a Runyankore Proverb, it’s Dr.Kajubiri who reserves all the rights and can decide to put a halt to usage of the same.
Also less known is the President’s step-sister, who goes by the name of Mariam, yet she also chooses to keep a low profile.
The life of Dr.Kajubiri could give us a few steroids for introspections, a moment for us to look inside and pick her brain, learn something about how to live with humility and still manage to make great contribution to the country, despite being related to the man at the helm.
In a New Vision article where the President eulogized his late mother, it was written;
“Museveni also commended his mother for educating his sister Kajubiri who holds a PHD. Kajubiri in 1955 was struck by polio which impaired her legs. According to Museveni, their father was hesitant to push her to trek to school which was many kilometers from their home but Kokundeka insisted that their daughter attends school where she excelled and won a scholarship to join Bweranyangi Girls School for the secondary education.”
For our personality of the month, BigEye.ug thus confers this title upon Dr.Kajubiru for her silent yet selfless service and the fact that she’s proof to everyone out there that a connection to the President doesn’t have to rob you of your humanity and service to the common man.
Dr.Kajubiri was born at the time when Ankole celebrated 50 years( Golden Jubilee). Like the President, her actual date of birth is not documented. Among her other contributions to Uganda, she formerly served as the General Secretary of the Wildlife Clubs of Uganda. Her 66 page University dissertation focused on “Studies on the pathogenicity of Dicrocoelium in a model definitive host Mesocricetus auratus (Waterhouse, 1983).” This was at the University of Hohenheim, Stuttgart, Germany. Presidential hopeful and one time aspirant, Olara Otunnu studied with Violet Kajubiri, at Makerere University in the early 1970s. Dr.Kajubiri was based at the Zoology Department at the time.
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