Ambassador James Muhangi Mugume
Board Member
Amb. James Mugume is a result-oriented retired Ugandan Permanent Secretary for Foreign Affairs and a highly accomplished professional Career Diplomat with long experience in global/regional foreign policy issues and diplomatic negotiations. During his tenure as a Ugandan Diplomat, His Excellency Mugume regularly provided professional advice to the President of Uganda, the Foreign Minister and to both the National and East African Community Parliaments on the development and implementation of key foreign policy issues and strategies.
A Board member of the Uganda Council on Foreign Relations with a close association with the Uganda Chamber of Mines and Petroleum. A strong in-depth understanding and coordination of multi-stakeholders involved in negotiations on Conflict Resolution in regional peace and security Initiatives, shared transboundary resources, regional integration, Climate Change, promotion of African cultures as well as bilateral and multi-lateral trade and investment negotiations.
Amb. Mugume provided leadership in Public Sector Management involving public, private and civil society partnerships towards achieving common goals. He has extensive experience in the allocation and management of large budgets based on strategic planning.
Amb. Mugume has a deep passion for the Arts and culture. He was a sought after actor in Shakespearean plays during his High School days. While at Makerere University, he was the Editor of the University’s Newspaper, ‘The Makererean’.
A graduate of Makerere University, Kampala, Uganda and Harvard Kennedy School of Government in Boston, USA, Ambassador Mugume has served at the Ugandan diplomatic missions in New Delhi, India; at the UN in New York, and Pretoria, South Africa. He is married to Mable with two sons Alex Biko and Nikkolas Soyinka.
Currently, he is a private consultant on Business and foreign policy issues and a farmer with a passion for community-based rural transformation in South Western Uganda.
Dennis Aguma
Board Member
Mr. Dennis Aguma is a Ugandan-British Entrepreneurship Facilitator and Business Incubation Manager, with hands-on experience of setting up business incubation centers and offering structural support for startups, SMEs and enterprise programmes at Universities in the UK and Africa.
With a BSc. Hons. Business Management (1st Class) from Kingston University, London, an MBA (Distinction) from University of Surrey (UK), Dennis is a Part-time lecturer and is currently doing a PhD at Birmingham City University University (UK) exploring the impact of entrepreneurial education on entrepreneurial effectiveness. Dennis is passionate about the creative industry and entrepreneurism in general, and a firm believer of their power to bring about a fair and equitable society.
Dennis is also the Founder of the Association of Student Enterprises (NASE) – a social enterprise set up in 2015 to inspire and champion skills and youth entrepreneurship in Ugandan Universities – www.nase.co.ug.
Prior to joining academia and the world of entrepreneurship, Mr. Aguma gained over 9 years’ corporate background experience, mainly from administering and managing pension scheme projects with FTSE 100 companies in London.
Dennis’ passion for The Arts started during his secondary school days at Mbarara High School where he was the Chairman of the Drama Club, and co-wrote a play that was performed by Mbarara High School at a number of other secondary schools in the region. He then had a short stint acting a number of plays at the National Theatre in Uganda whilst at university, before veering into the world of business and finance.
Allen Tush Naturinda
Board Member
Allen Tush Naturinda is a member of Lions Clubs international currently working as Certified Senior
Trainer for Lions Quest Program in Anglophone Africa with Lions Clubs International Volunteer Organization.
She has been practicing Art in the field of applied arts in Education since 2002 when she was Research Assistant at Music Dance and Drama Department, Makerere University. Her passion was born out of the field examinations then called People’s theatre which she led as a field exam coordinator for the practical exams, and Theatre for Development out reach programs under UNICEF in south western
Uganda Region.
Allen Tush is a graduate of Witwatersrand with Masters in Applied Arts in Education. It’s from her research on Techniques of creative Facilitation in Applied Art that she discovered her unique talent on working with cross cultural audiences in creating art together. She has worked with different children and youth groups to create music and drama and staging them.
Allen Tush has been able to practice her facilitation skills in Arts with other Networks, she is member of International Initiatives for cooperation through which she represented In Movement Art for Social Change on the Steps for Life Project in five Countries, Creating Art with University Students (Uganda,
Bulgaria, Mexico, Indonesia and Vietnam).
Mbabazi NOrman
Board Secretary
Mbabazi Norman works as an Associate with M/s. Nyanzi, Kiboneka and Mbabazi Advocates whereat he is a practicing IP attorney. Through practice, Norman is and continues to be an accomplished trial advocate in intellectual property. Mr. Mbabazi is an emerging strength in IP in Uganda as he has assisted establish the IP training Institute in Uganda (National Institute of Intellectual Property (NIIPM)) and his vast experience has helped the IP Centre to emerge as a force for good in IP in Uganda. He is the Director Copyright and Creative Economy at Intellectual Property Centre.
Catherine Bagaaya
Board Member
Catherine Bagaaya is a member of Fun Factory, a Ugandan leading Comedy production outfit. She stands as a versatile player on both the Theatre and Film scene of Uganda. She is the leader of the Creative writing department of Fun Factory. Apart from writing, Cathy is a practicing Actor, Producer, Film set designer and script writing teacher. She has also participated under the Umbrella of Film 256 as a Script Writing Facilitator in Kasese (2018) and at the recently completed Writing workshop at Ebony Heights (2021) in partnership with the US Embassy.
She has trained drama to refugees in Nakivale to be used as a tool to sensitize their fellow refugees on issues affecting their communities under the OXFAM Organization.
She has worked on projects like ‘The Hostel’, 5@Home, Girl From Mparo, Mpeke Town, Jangu Tulye, Butter Flies of Uganda, Mizigo Express to mention but a few.
