Leah Namugerwa:The life and activism 2026
Leah Namugerwa is an active youth climate activist from Uganda who is emerging as one of the major voices of a global movement to combat environmental damage and deforestation caused by climate change. Born in 2004, she is part of a younger group of African youth that refuse to accept an environmentally damaged world, that will take responsibility to force global leaders to be accountable, and that will develop local based solutions to address the climate emergency.
Namugerwa is known for her relentless advocacy on behalf of the environment and is the co-founder of the Ugandan branch of Fridays for Future, creator of the Birthday Trees project, and a strong advocate for the implementation of environmental laws. Her development from being a concerned teenager to becoming a widely recognized climate warrior is an example of how powerful youth activism can be.
Early life and the spark of activism
Leah Namugerwa was born in 2004 in Uganda. As such, Namugerwa experienced firsthand the impact of climate change on Uganda, although this issue was largely absent or misrepresented in mainstream media. Namugerwa belongs to the Anglican Church of Uganda, and environmental advocacy runs through her family; her uncle, Tim Mugerwa, is a well-known environmental advocate in Uganda.
It was at the young age of 13 that Namugerwa’s true passion for advocacy began. At this time, while watching a local news broadcast on television, Namugerwa witnessed firsthand the devastating impacts of climate change in her home country. The news broadcast indicated extreme food shortages in northern Uganda as a result of droughts lasting longer than they normally should. Additionally, it stated that there were tragic landslide disasters happening in the east part of the country, which resulted in loss of life — both of these disasters were due to changes in weather and climate change.
I find this image disturbing. As a child with her friends, she observed that the natural world she experienced was changing and it made her feel angry and sad. Her anger quickly turned into a desire to take some kind of action to address global environmental problems. She understood that the stories of polluted rivers and lost forests were not isolated to her community; they were being told throughout Africa and around the globe.
Namugerwa felt the media did not adequately report on these issues and therefore there was no adequate adult leadership. “There are so many environmental issues occurring in my country and I rarely hear about them in the media or reported by an adult,” she stated. In her view, the media would much rather cover political events and celebrity gossip than the injustices of environmental degradation. She also believed that the lack of reporting on environmental injustice was done intentionally. Since she determined that adults were unwilling to provide the necessary leadership, she decided to act voluntarily based on the belief that environmental injustice is an injustice to her.
The Inspiration of Greta Thunberg and the Development of a Movement
In 2018, Namugerwa first learned about Greta Thunberg, a Swedish teenage girl who had begun organizing school strikes outside of her country’s Parliament to advocate for governmental action to stop climate change. At first, the idea of a “school strike” confused Namugerwa because the term “strike” in Uganda was always associated with violence.
She asked her father what a school strike for climate change was, and he explained to her that Thunberg was simply refusing to go to school on Fridays to express her peaceful frustration with the government’s inaction. When Namugerwa asked her father if such a thing could be done in Uganda, her father replied, yes it could be. Inspired by her fathers’ words and her own online research on the impact of Greta’s actions, Namugerwa made the decision to take action.
February 2019 was when Namugerwa, who was then just 14 years old, began to follow Greta Thunberg on Twitter and also initiate her own climate strike. Her first day as a climate striker was alone, standing in the middle of a Kampala suburb with a placard at the roadside. To her it seemed like the right thing to do, but many people walking past her (including some members of her family) thought it looked strange. Many were confused and shook their heads as they passed by.
Although there was a lot of stigma and a great deal of fear about what would happen if the Ugandan government saw them protesting – for example Bob Matovu, another one of the strikers, had his placard taken away and he was chased out of parliament by police and the first big protest was blocked in May 2019 – Namugerwa continued to fight for this cause. She eventually paired up with Sadrach Nirere, Hilda Flavia Nakabuye, and her cousin Bob Motavu and they officially formed Fridays For Future Uganda. The Uganda branch of Fridays For Future was soon one of the largest and most active chapters of the global Fridays For Future movement.
Campaigns & Grass Roots Initiatives
While many activists are content to hold up signs, Namugerwa has made her activism much more than just holding signs. She has made her activism into an actionable form of grass roots environmental activism. As such, she has been responsible for a number of large scale campaigns that have directly impacted both her local and national communities.
Birthday Trees Project
One of Namugerwa’s most successful campaigns was the Birthday Trees campaign. When Namugerwa turned 15, instead of throwing herself a big birthday party, she threw a tree planting party. At the time of the event she planted 200 trees, a direct reaction to the large amounts of deforestation that exist in Uganda today. Deforestation in Uganda is one of the biggest contributors to the country’s increasing amount of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere, which has caused loss of habitats for countless animals, as well as food security issues throughout the country.
Climate Change Awareness Project
This is a new initiative that will allow people to celebrate their special events by supporting reforestation. Namugerwa wants to achieve something big through this project. Her goal is to grow one million or more trees. “Living for others is the way of nature”, she says, “plants don’t eat, rivers don’t drink.”
Plastic Bag Ban Petition
Namugerwa has also advocated for government enforcement of policies. She wrote a petition and organized a campaign to urge the Kampala government to enact a law banning plastic bags, which contribute heavily to littering the Ugandan countryside. She continues to push the government to adhere to all environmental laws and complete implementation of the Paris Climate Agreement.
Clean-Ups and Strikes at Schools
Friday’s are no longer just an ordinary day for Namugerwa, now that she has made them her busiest days. Every Friday since February 2019, she has protested and given speeches at regional capitals while attending school. In addition to her protests, she and other students organize clean-up activities in communities (e.g., cleaning the shores of Kampala’s Ggaba Beach) in observance of global climate strikes and collaborate with local agriculture/conservation organizations.
Reality of Climate Change in Uganda
Namugerwa’s activism stems from the difficult realities that Uganda faces. Countries in East Africa experience some of the greatest deforestation rates on the continent. Forest loss, combined with increased climate variability (heavy rains/flooding/intense droughts), has increased the vulnerability of the region to climate extremes. This has resulted in reduced crop yields and livestock production, and therefore a sharp increase in food insecurity.
She has also been involved in international recognition and global platforms. In this way, while she acknowledges that voices from the Global South are frequently marginalized and recognizes that “it takes a lot of work for a climate activist from Uganda to be listened to internationally,” she has fought and won a place at the table.
Award from Amnesty International: As part of Fridays For Future, Namugerwa received Amnesty International’s highest human rights award for her continuous activism.
Youth Delegate for COP25: At the 25th Conference of the Parties (COP25), the UN Climate Change Conference, held in Madrid, Namugerwa was a youth delegate there; she attended the conference where she met her idol, Greta Thunberg.
Speeches for World Urban Forum (2020) & World Habitat Day (2021):
Namugerwa presented two impassioned speeches on urban climate action and green transportation to advocate for environmentally-friendly urban planning due to climate change.
Impact at COP27 (“The African COP”): Namugerwa may have made an even greater impact at the COP27 Climate Summit in Sharm el-Sheikh, Egypt in November 2022.
The COP27 Speech
Namugerwa made her voice heard when she gave a heartfelt speech at the opening ceremony of COP27 on November 7, 2022. Her remarks were candid regarding the youth of her generation being robbed of their youth:
“The same thing happened to many young people, myself included, I lost my childhood. We were forced to grow up too fast; to think and to act as adults before we could even see that our futures were being closed off, that our dreams were being destroyed, that our home, our Mother Earth, was burning and drying out and that we would do nothing about it.”
Namugerwa directly addressed all of the world leaders at the summit to address the difficult realities of the climate crisis. She emphasized that the world was facing an emergency due to fossil fuel consumption and the huge disparity of the impact of climate change with regards to Africa’s contribution (less than 4% of global carbon emissions) vs. the impact it suffers from. She also called into question whether world leaders were actually listening to the youth, or simply dismissing them and demanded that they stop putting profit ahead of people. “We’ve had enough of your empty words, inaction and hypocrisy” she exclaimed, and urged world leaders to act as if their house was on fire.
Youth Activism and Social Media
Namugerwa understands the power of digital communications, and utilizes social media to help spread her message. In addition to posting pictures of herself working on environmental projects, such as planting trees, she also encourages other young people to become engaged in helping protect the planet by doing the same.
The young people of Africa are using social media and digital platforms to demand action from governments, corporations, and international organizations via protests, lobbying, and digital campaigns. The fact that there is an increasing number of young people aware of these issues provides Namugerwa with optimism. Although she has received criticism from some who feel that she should be in school instead of protesting, Namugerwa finds solace knowing that many young people are supporting her efforts.
Namugerwa as a teen from developing country is worried about her future. She states that if youth don’t stand up for themselves they won’t have a future. “The current leaders may leave office, but we will continue to endure the consequences of what they are doing or not doing.” Despite this, she has not given up. The motivation behind her actions is a sense of purpose, and it is an inspiration to a whole generation of environmentally conscious people to prove that no matter how indifferent the institutions are, youth will lead the charge to protect the earth.
