Jane Uwera is the owner of Penda Kusoma, a publishing house that also operates a bookshop at KBC building in the City of Kigali suburb of Kacyiru. She shared with Pontian Kabeera her journey to the book business, starting as a vendor.

Who is Jane Uwera?

I was born in Kiruhura [western Uganda], in 1975 to the late Augustine Gasimbazi and Suzan Masigiza, but later moved to Mutukula at the Uganda-Tanzania border.

I attended Kibuli Demonstration School in Kampala from P1-6 before returning to Mutukula Primary School where I sat primary leaving examinations.

From Mutukula, I returned to Kampala and was admitted to Bishop’s Senior School Mukono for O-level and there after relocated to Rwanda in 1997 for and attended A-level at Lycee de Kigali.

After Senior Six, I returned to Uganda to pursue a diploma in Tours and Travel from Geneva. Currently, I am doing degree in business management online.

How did you get into the business of books?

I worked with various tour and travel companies in Kigali after school, but my childhood passion was always reading. I read books all the time and feel bad whenever I see someone doing nothing and not reading a book. You can never be informed unless you read various literally works by many authors. It is the love for reading that inspired me into selling books—starting with schools and non-government organisations.

The birth of Penda Kusoma (Love Reading)

After selling and promoting books by various publishers, I decided to exploit the experience I had gathered and started a publishing company to publish books for children aged three to 11.

When you read books, you gain reading skills and grow intellectually. Reading also eliminates redundancy and its consequences—hence increasing a child’s concentration levels. It is for that reason that I started Penda Kusoma using my savings of Rwf2million from book dealership.

Penda Kusoma has published 31 titles since 2010 and the major customers include NGOs that in education sector as well as the Ministry of Education. The books aim at helping children to develop the reading culture.

In addition to publishing, we also sell various text books in the curricula for both arts and sciences at primary and secondary level. At the moment, we publish only in Kinyarwanda but plan to start publishing in English next year; as well as in Kiswahili.

How have you benefited?

A lot of things have worked in my favour. I have acquired more skills in publishing and extra-ordinary exposure which has kept me going since venturing into this business four years ago.I have partnered with Rwanda Education Board. The board always buys my books and like them so much.

Any challenges?

The most challenging part of publishing, especially here in Rwanda, is the poor reading culture. Most people do not understand anything in the publishing industry and therefore don’t buy books; they absolutely attach no value to reading.

Perspective on women in business

Government policy on women has laid a foundation for the increasing number of women in business. The Chamber of Women Entrepreneurs has done tremendous work in increasing the number of women entrepreneurs by sensitising women in various business fields such as ICT, commerce, agriculture. This has played a big role in improving the status of women in the country.