Angeline (Angie) Murimirwa

Angie’s teacher used to tell her how much her intellect reminded him of her mother’s. These were bitter words for Angie, who wept the same tears, because she knew her education was coming to an end. Though she graduated primary school not only with the best results in her school, but in her district, there was no hope of continuing to secondary education.

At this time CAMFED Zimbabwe had just just started its first program in her rural community, and Angie qualified for educational support. She was provided with secondary school fees, uniform, books and menstrual products, and was supported to stay in the school’s boarding house, as she lived too far away to walk to school every day. All these items had simply been out of reach before. Yet Angie remembers feeling guilty when she had regular meals at school, wondering if her family would manage to eat that day.

She sank into a kind of depression until a male teacher, who’d come from a similar marginalized background, lectured the group of students. He said that dropping out was not going to help their families – it was through their education that they would be able to secure a different future for their loved ones.

That’s when Angie fully seized her chance to learn and excel. She became one of the first 400 girls to graduate secondary school with CAMFED’s support, and was a founding member of the CAMFED Association of women leaders educated with CAMFED support, also known as CAMA. Coming together for the first time, Angie and her peers knew that even after the triumph of completing school, many obstacles lay ahead. All eager to support their families, they remained at risk of exploitation and early marriage, as they sought a source of income in rural areas with high unemployment.

Angie with children in Zimbabwe in 2003 (Photo: Mark Read/CAMFED)

Angie with secondary school girls in Zimbabwe in 2017 (Photo: CAMFED)

Angie found the strength and charisma to stand as their leader, and was elected by her peers as the first ever CAMFED Association Chairperson in Zimbabwe. She knew that separately their endeavors might fail, or they might become trapped in lives of early childbearing and domestic labor. However, as a sisterhood they could share ideas, knowledge and opportunities, protect each others’ interests and grow into the female role models desperately needed by the next cohort of girls finishing school.

Angie went on to volunteer for CAMFED, then became an employed program coordinator, and eventually CAMFED Zimbabwe’s first National Executive Director.

Many of CAMFED’s supporters in North America got to know her story from the best-selling book ‘Half the Sky’ by Nick Kristoff and Sheryl WuDunn, released in 2009. Angie was part of the team leading CAMFED’s expansion into Ghana, Zambia, Tanzania and Malawi, using her own experience to build trust in partner communities, and was eventually promoted to Regional Executive Director for East Africa.

Angie played a key role in the launch CAMFED’s Learner Guide Program, which sees CAMFED Association members returning to their local schools as mentors and life skills coaches, and fills the gaps young people identified in school and after school. CAMFED Association members are integral in galvanizing communities to support their children in education, understand the challenges they face, and band together to find solutions.

Angie Murimirwa (left) with two CAMFED Association sisters and Malala Yousafzai’s youth ambassadors in New York in 2015, including Malala’s friends Kainat Riaz (in red) and Shazia Ramzan (in yellow), who were also injured in the attack on Malala in 2012.  (Photo: CAMFED/Anke Adams)

Angie Murimirwa (far left) and Fiona Mavhinga (far right) stand with CAMFED Association leaders, a traditional leader and the chair of a Mother Support Group in Zimbabwe, all partnering to educate girls and empower women. (Photo:  Harriet Grigg/CAMFED)

Angie continues to be an active member of the CAMFED Association, and works closely with her friend and colleague Fiona Mavhinga – Executive Adviser, CAMFED Association – to guide and mentor this powerful movement. Association members collectively support tens of thousands of children each year to go to primary and secondary school through their own philanthropy.  Angie is particularly proud of the Association’s unique and vital role in ensuring CAMFED’s work is scalable and sustainable.

In 2017, Angeline was recognized as one of the 100 most influential women by the BBC, and Rihanna’s Clara Lionel Foundation presented Angie with the 2017 Diamond Ball Honours Award, recognizing her past, present and future support of young leaders, entrepreneurship and civic engagement. At the end of that year, she was appointed CAMFED’s Executive Director in Africa, working as CAMFED Co-Executive alongside CEO Lucy Lake

In 2020, Angie and Lucy, who steered the organization through a global pandemic and worked closely with young women and partners at every level to ensure that girls were kept safe and learning, were honored with the Yidan Prize for Education Development, and joined its Council of Luminaries. That same year, New York Times columnist and two-time Pulitzer Prize winner Nicholas Kristof surprised Angie with the announcement that he had selected CAMFED as the Grand Prize winner of the Kristof Holiday Impact Prize.

In 2021, Angie accepted the Conrad N. Hilton Humanitarian Prize on behalf of CAMFED. In 2022, CNN profiled Angie during a trip to Malawi, where she showcased the impact of other young women in the CAMFED Association, who are keeping girls in school, running businesses, and taking climate action. 

In January 2023, Angie took up the baton from Lucy Lake to become CAMFED’s CEO. She continues to work closely with Lucy to rally communities, strategic partners, government ministries and supporters across the globe around the urgent imperative of supporting vulnerable girls to thrive in school and beyond the school gates. Together with their colleagues across the globe, they are ensuring that the lived experience and leadership of those once at the margins informs CAMFED’s program development and delivery at every level.

Throughout Angie’s leadership journey, her mother has remained her inspiration and role model. Angie often quotes her words when talking about the unstoppable power and persistence of the educated young women in the CAMFED Association, our leadership network: