This series is for those who read "Do You Pay Your Taxes?" and wanted more. The voices in that article asked honest questions. Where does our money go? Why does the system feel rigged? Why do women bear the heaviest burden? This series provides the answers, one layer at a time. Each piece examines a different dimension of tax justice through a feminist political economy lens. Together, they reveal the architecture of a system designed by the powerful, for the powerful. And th

A Feminist's Guide to Who Pays, Who Benefits, and Who Decides This article is for anyone who has ever wondered: where does our money go? Why does the system feel rigged? What is tax justice, and why should I care? It lays the foundation for the "Tax Justice through a Feminist Lens" series. If you are new to these ideas, start here.   The series spotlights women. Not because they are the only ones the system fails, but because their experience exposes tax injustice most clearl

This series examines tax justice through a feminist lens. Previous pieces asked who holds power over tax systems, how gender assumptions are baked into fiscal policy, what it means to be an economic ghost, how daily levies extract without recording, and what happens when the economic ghost reaches old age. This article asks what happens when she falls sick. When she gives birth. When she dies.   The voices in Kampala said: "I have never accessed free healthcare. Not once." Th

This series examines tax justice through a feminist lens. Previous pieces asked who holds power over tax systems, how gender assumptions are baked into fiscal policy, what it means to be an economic ghost, and how daily levies extract without recording. This article unpacks the second layer of invisibility named in Part Three: what happens to the economic ghost when she is old.   The woman who pays market fees for forty years will retire with nothing. The woman who pays presu

This series examines tax justice through a feminist lens. Previous pieces asked who holds power over tax systems, how gender assumptions are baked into fiscal policy, and what it means to be an economic ghost—visible in your daily contributions, invisible in official records.   Part Three introduced three layers of invisibility: the daily levies that extract without recording, the pension systems that exclude informal workers, and the problem of proving income without officia

This is part of a series: "Tax Justice Through a Feminist Lens". The series builds on my previous articles, " Do You Pay Your Taxes? " and " Taxation and the Redistribution of Power " and " The Tax System's Blind Eye to Women ". Those articles asked honest questions. Where does our money go? Why does the system feel rigged? Why do women bear the heaviest burden? Who decides what you pay? Who holds the power to design tax systems?   This series provides the answers, one layer

This is part of a series: "Tax Justice Through a Feminist Lens". The series builds on my previous articles, " Do You Pay Your Taxes? " and "Taxation and the Redistribution of Power" . Those articles asked honest questions. Where does our money go? Why does the system feel rigged? Why do women bear the heaviest burden? Who decides what you pay? Who holds the power to design tax systems?   This series provides the answers, one layer at a time. Each piece examines a different di

This is part of a series: "Tax Justice Through a Feminist Lens" . The series builds on my previous article, "Do You Pay Your Taxes?" The voices in that article asked honest questions. Where does our money go? Why does the system feel rigged? Why do women bear the heaviest burden? This series provides the answers, one layer at a time. Each piece examines a different dimension of tax justice through a feminist political economy lens. Together, they reveal the architecture of a

Do you pay your taxes? It is a simple question. It deserves an honest answer. Many of us hesitate. We calculate. We think about what we can deduct, what we can hide, what we can avoid. Why do people evade taxes? Because it saves money. Because the system feels unfair. Because everyone else seems to be doing it. Because we do not see where our money goes.   I talked to some taxpayers. This is what citizens in Kampala told me. These could be voices from most cities in Africa.  

I am a quiet person. My natural reserve is often misread as pride. Yet, I am relentlessly vocal. I say and write the things marked taboo. This contradiction has earned me a label. Rebel. The label is correct. To break a profound silence, you must first become a fracture in the expectation of quiet. This is not about personality. It is about principle. The silence I break is not my own quiet nature. It is the enforced quiet around injustice. That quiet is not peace. It is a su

A visitor comes to the door. The call goes out. Is there anyone here? Is anyone at home? From within, a woman’s voice answers. No. Nobody.   But she is there. Her daughters are there. The house is full of living, breathing human beings. Yet her answer is immediate and certain. Nobody.   This is not a lie. It is a reflex. It is a truth forged in the daily fire of being unseen. In that moment, she translates the question through a brutal cultural dictionary. “Anyone” does not m

Can a digital tool be neutral? A government launches an online portal for reporting gender-based violence. The technical achievement is clear. Now consider the woman in a rural community with poor network coverage. She might share a mobile device with her husband or brother. Does she know the portal exists? Can she access it safely, without fear of someone seeing her search history in the phone’s log? Does the form require a stable internet connection she cannot maintain? Doe

What happens when a simple act—holding a rail—becomes an excuse for violation? What does it mean when a corporation tells you your safety is less important than its profit? And what are you supposed to do when they look you in the eye and say, "We are untouchables"?   This is not a complaint. It is evidence.   It was early evening on December 27, 2025. The day after Boxing day. A busy time. I entered Capital Shoppers Supermarket in Nakawa, Kampala, opposite Makerere Universit

What does it mean to hold your peace? Is silence a shield or a cage? When does a tactical pause become a permanent surrender? I carry a specific piece of wisdom from my mother, given at the start of my marriage. She advised that when my husband began a quarrel, I should take a mouthful of water but not swallow it. Her meaning was literal. With a full mouth, you cannot talk back. This instruction was a lesson in the complex power of silence. It was both a strategy for de-escal

Your inaction is not passive. It is an active, internal transaction. In the heartbeat between seeing harm and looking away, you make a bargain. You trade her safety for your comfort. You exchange her dignity for your social ease. You choose the myth of "not my business" over the brutal truth of her reality. This is the bystander's bargain. It is the unspoken pact that holds the architecture of violence intact. We are not just witnesses; we are its guarantors, paying for our p

When the police do not come, when the law is a distant rumour, when the house is no longer a shelter, what happens? The world assumes paralysis. It expects waiting. It is wrong. Women do not just wait for rescue. They become architects. They become engineers and builders of their own safety. They survey the dangerous landscape and draft blueprints with nothing but their wits and their will. This 16 Days of Activism, we must spotlight this relentless, ingenious work. This is n

We claim to value truth. We build monuments to justice. We teach our children to speak up. Yet when a woman speaks about her violation, a different machinery engages. Our first instinct is not belief. It is interrogation. We demand evidence where there can be none. We question her memory as if trauma files a perfect report. We scrutinise her character, her past, her tone. This is not a natural response. It is a learnt, cultural reflex. It is a defence mechanism for a social o

I once sat in a room and helped a man build a cage for his wife. I did not lift a hammer. I did not twist a wire. I simply listened. A friend, a man I respected, dissected his wife’s character over a low table. He listed her flaws as if reading a defective inventory. He critiqued her failures, her tone of voice, the very space she occupied in his world. We called it venting. We called it a private moment among men. We nodded. We offered him more tea. We changed the subject.  

What do we choose to protect when we call a violent man ‘good’? The phrase echoes in the aftermath, a haunting refrain that isolates survivors and shields perpetrators. We hear it from neighbours, from relatives, even from our own conflicted minds. “But he was such a good man.” This myth of the dual identity is not a nuance. It is a lie. It is one of the most pervasive and dangerous obstacles to ending gender-based violence. It is the social alibi that lets cruelty walk free.

What does justice look like when the verdict is delivered, but the woman is still broken? The current system often fails survivors of gender-based violence. The formal, colonial-era court process can be a retraumatising labyrinth. It is alienating, slow, and focused overwhelmingly on a single question. That question is not “How is she?” It is “How do we punish him?” In this punitive model, the survivor becomes a witness for the state. Her needs are secondary to the legal proc