Immaculee Ilibagiza

Who is Immaculee Ilibagiza?

Immaculee Ilibagiza was born in 1972 in Mataba, Rwanda, and studied electrical and mechanical engineering at the National University of Rwanda. During the 1994 Rwandan genocide, she survived by hiding for 91 days in a cramped bathroom, roughly three feet by four feet, along with seven other women, concealed behind a wardrobe in the home of a local Hutu pastor. Most of her immediate family, including her parents and two brothers, were killed during the genocide. Four years later she emigrated to the United States and began working at the United Nations in New York City. In 2006 she published her autobiography, "Left to Tell: Discovering God Amidst the Rwandan Holocaust," co-written with Steve Erwin, which became a New York Times bestseller, has been translated into seventeen languages, and has sold nearly two million copies worldwide. She went on to write several further books on faith and forgiveness, established the Left to Tell Charitable Fund in 2007 to support Rwandan orphans, received the Mahatma Gandhi International Award for Reconciliation and Peace in 2007, and became a naturalized United States citizen in 2013. She now works full-time as an author and public speaker.

Sources: Immaculee Ilibagiza with Steve Erwin, Left to Tell: Discovering God Amidst the Rwandan Holocaust (2006) · Penguin Random House, author biography · Vail Daily, profile of Immaculee Ilibagiza