Mohammed Kateregga receives the Yoast Care fund for his contribution to the WordPress community

Meet Mohammed Kateregga, a cherished member of the WordPress Community Team! His dedication and invaluable contributions are precisely why Joan Namunina nominated him for the Yoast Care fund. Let’s take a moment to get to know this passionate WordPress enthusiast a bit better.

Nominator Joan Namunina: “Mohammed Kateregga is a technopreneur, data scientist, mobile and web app developer, and educator with over a decade of experience in tech, primarily in WordPress, data engineering, cloud, security, AI, and DevOps. As a community leader and co-organizer of the WordPress Jinja Meetup Community for the past four years, Mohammed has supported and played a vital role in growing WordPress adoption in Eastern Uganda. An ardent educator and active Rotarian, he supports diversity by volunteering in Rotary. He trains youth and overlooked demographics like women to transition into tech, including myself, a former teacher in WordPress and web design. He has co-organized WordCamp Jinja since 2022 and charity WordPress hackathons for NGOs since 2021, providing free web design services. Mohammed’s leadership, passion, and recent role as the lead organizer of WordCamp Jinja 2024.”

Let’s get to know Mohammed Kateregga

That’s quite an introduction, Joan! We would love to get to know Mohammed even better. That’s why we asked him some questions about his work and his passion for WordPress:

Hi, Mohammed! What do you do?

I am a tech entrepreneur, full-stack mobile and web developer, data analyst, cloud and blockchain engineer educator, and community leader based in Jinja, Uganda. In addition, I have founded multiple social impact-driven tech startups. Most relevantly Hello World Africa and Xerus Media Group, focusing on education, media, finance, tech incubation, and innovation. I am also deeply passionate about and involved in growing the tech landscape in Eastern Uganda over the past decade through various communities, initiatives, and programs. Currently, I lead the GDG Cloud Jinja Chapter and WordPress Jinja community. I served as a co-organizer of the Jinja WordPress Meetup and helped co-organize several WordCamps in Jinja and our annual Charity WordPress Website Hackathons for NGOs and Startups in Jinja since our first in 2021. Most recently, I served as the lead organizer of WordCamp Jinja 2024.

I love volunteering and am an active Rotarian in the Rotary Club of Jinja City. In addition to that, I enjoy giving back to the community. Regularly, I mentor youth in tech and entrepreneurship, guiding/mentoring them through the cloud, blockchain and data engineering, web, and app development using Python, JavaScript, and WordPress et, al and also startup building both in the communities I lead and also my mentees, students, and alumni at Refectory, Andela, CodeIT Institute of Technology, Hello World Africa, et al. and through other online initiatives and academies, as well as physical outreaches too, most recently at Macedonian Vocational School in rural Jinja, Eastern Uganda during our WordCamp Jinja 2024 with more outreaches planned.

Why WordPress?

WordPress is more than just a content management system. It’s a fantastic open-source ecosystem with an inclusive and supportive global community that empowers people. Its ease of use makes it ideal for beginners and seasoned developers. WordPress gives us the tools to build powerful websites and, more importantly, a platform to teach others. I’ve introduced WordPress to many young people, showing them how it can help them create, share their stories, and even build their businesses. The community aspect is also unmatched; there’s always someone willing to help or collaborate, making it a truly inclusive space.

Who is your WordPress mentor?

I’ve had many mentors in my journey, too many to name all here. Still, I truly appreciate and thank them all, especially all those locally in Uganda, East Africa, and globally. You all hold a special place in my heart. Let me take this chance to express my appreciation to the two of you who have stood out regarding WordPress in Uganda. Firstly, Arthur Kasirye is my current WordPress mentor. His guidance has been instrumental in helping me navigate and grow our WordPress community and events and hone my skills and community leadership. Arthur’s problem-solving approach and commitment to using WordPress for meaningful impact and contributing to the WordPress Community and Polyglots team. He has been a constant source of motivation for me to do the same since I was doing that in Google Crowdsource to enhance the diversity and localization of open-source projects. I look forward to contributing to more teams in WordPress in the coming months and years.

Secondly, Rogers Mukalele, who has been a leading figure in popularizing WordPress in Uganda. His work has inspired many, including me, to embrace it fully and advocate for it. Together, we organized the first WordPress Website Hackathon in Jinja, in 2021 and our WordCamp in Jinja in 2022. We have been steadily growing the tech and WordPress community in Eastern Uganda. His dedication to WordCamps, WordPress events, Hackathons, and the wider WordPress community locally has been a powerful source of inspiration and encouragement to do the same and increase our impact in our local communities.

Lastly, I thank all the community team members, co-leads, and fellow organizers in Uganda, East Africa, Africa, and globally with whom I have interacted. You have all equally been inspirational and a great support system. I look forward to continuing to collaborate with all of you and increasing our impact across the country, region, continent, and globally.

What would you love to do in the future?

I want to collectively, through our initiatives, programs, and with all supportive partners and our communities, continue building a strong innovation culture and uplift the tech landscape and innovation in Eastern Uganda, East Africa, and Africa as a whole, particularly by empowering youth through leveraging accessible technologies like WordPress. I’m also actively encouraging members in the developer communities I lead and my students/mentees from CIT, Andela, Refactory, and Hello World Africa to develop local solutions that meet the specific needs of African businesses and communities.

I’d love to see more African solutions and narratives digitized and shared globally through WordPress. I’m excited to continue contributing to WordPress and all impactful open-source projects to make them more localized and diverse. I hope to expand our impact to offer more comprehensive digital solutions and eLearning platforms, making tech education in technologies like WordPress accessible to everyone through accessible mobile apps and web platforms in the coming months and years, and possibly future integrations with Web3/Blockchain, VR/AR, IoT, and other emerging technologies.

Where can people find you online, at WordCamps, or other meetups?

I participate in various tech communities and events in Jinja, Eastern Uganda, and East Africa. I mostly use Google Developer Groups and WordPress communities that I lead/volunteer in, among others, like Open Source Community Africa, Internet Society Uganda, et al. I’m on Twitter and LinkedIn, where I engage with fellow developers, tech entrepreneurs, and open source and WordPress enthusiasts. I regularly organize, attend, speak, or volunteer at local Meetups or WordCamps, including our annual WordCamp Jinja and others. In addition, I organize other tech events within the local GDG, Cloud, and Blockchain developers communities. I will continue to contribute actively to the WordPress community team, so we can always link up in the official WordPress Community Slack.

Thank you for this interview, Mohammed, and all your contributions to the WordPress community! Do you know someone like Mohammed Kateregga who deserves to be in the spotlight? Go to our Yoast Care page and nominate them right away.