The Uganda Engineers Registration Board on 6th December 2019 bestowed upon the Chief Executive Officer of the Electricity Regulatory Authority, Eng. Ziria Tibalwa Waako, an Engineering Excellence Award, 2019.

The Award was in recognition of Eng. Waako’s “Outstanding Service to the Engineering Profession”, on the occasion to mark the 50th Anniversary of the Uganda Engineers Registration Board, and the 6th Engineers’ Forum.

Eng. Waako has vast knowledge and experience of the Electricity Supply Industry in Uganda where she has worked for close to 30 years now, having started off her career working with the Uganda Electricity Board (UEB) in the Operations and Planning Department. She boasts of having been among the first group of Ugandans to operate the computerized Supervisory Control and Data Acquisition (SCADA) system for the remote operation and monitoring of the Electrical Power System Network.

During the divestiture of UEB, Eng. Waako was transferred to the Uganda Electricity Transmission Company Limited, where she served as the Operational Planning Engineer, Senior Planning Engineer and Principal Planning Engineer.

Prior to her appointment as Chief Executive Officer of the Electricity Regulatory Authority in March 2017, Eng. Waako served as the Director Technical Regulation at ERA for a period of Four (4) years. In this role, she was responsible for providing leadership to the Technical Regulation Department; setting performance targets for Licensees, monitoring and enforcing Licensees’ Technical and Environmental compliance with the applicable Laws, Regulations, and Licensing terms and conditions.

She holds the Masters of Science and Bachelor of Science Degrees in Electrical Engineering, both from Makerere University, and a Master of Business Administration in Leadership degree from Walden University, USA.

Eng. Waako is a Registered Engineer with the Uganda Institute of Professional Engineers and the National Engineers Registration Board, as well as a Member of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) of New York, United States of America.

She is the first female to assume the role of Chief Executive Officer of the Electricity Regulatory Authority.