Mulenga Kapwepwe


Mulenga Mpundu Kapwepwe is a Zambian author, co-founder of the Zambian Women's History Museum and is the daughter to Simon Kapwepwe Zambia's former vice-president. She is also known for building libraries in Lusaka, Zambia's capital, to help young children educate themselves.

Career

Kapwepwe began writing her own plays early on in her career with the lack of a formal theater education. As an author, Kapwepwe has written a number of award-winning plays and books. In addition to writing and producing educational materials, short stories and plays, Mulenga has produced videos, television and radio programmes on a number of subjects.
She served as the chairperson of the National Arts Council of Zambia, from 2004 until 2017. She also served as the Patron of a number of associations, including the Women in Visual Arts Association, the Zambian Folk Music and Dance Association, and the Youth For Culture Association. She has been Vice Chairman of the Ukusefya pa Ngwena Cultural Association, Zambia National Visual Arts Council and The Zambia Women Writers Association. Kapwepwe also sits on the Zambia Commission for UNESCO and the Arts Institute of Africa and is the chairperson of the Arterial Network.

Women's History Museum

In 2016 Kapwepwe together with her counterpart Samba Yonga developed the Zambian Museum of Women's History, initially as an online-only offering but with a view to having a physical location to allow display of artifacts collected by the project. The project is in conjunction with the Kvinnohistoriskt museum, a women's history museum in Sweden. This initiative, is set to increase the number of narratives on Wikipedia of Zambian women who have contributed to the country’s traditional and contemporary history, and help to make the internet more gender-equal.

Awards

Artistic achievement

Notable books