As a network, we are excited to announce the ATHENA’s adolescent girls and young women’s governance board. We firmly believe that adolescent girls and young women are experts on their own lives, and therefore, their active participation should be at the center of our work and governance as we work towards fashioning sustainable changes to ensure that they live in a world where they can thrive. The governance board will lead the network in advancing our mission to amplify the voices and spotlight the experiences of adolescent girls, young women, and gender diverse people as we advocate for gender equality, human rights, sexual reproductive health and rights, ending gender-based violence and gender-transformative HIV interventions.
ATHENA’s Journey Toward Paving a Feminist Future……
In 2019, ATHENA began an exciting transitional journey intending to strengthen our internal governance systems, including our board, to align with our vision to build on the leadership of the adolescent girls and young women we partner and collaborate with. Our transition began at the sidelines of the ICPD+25 Nairobi Summit consultations with young women leaders across Eastern and Southern Africa and from the world to lay the foundation for a clear picture of the transitional process. From these conversations, there was a vital sign of the need to establish an independent young women’s advisory board or incorporate more women within the ATHENA’s existing advisory board. Building on the consultations from 2019, during the ICPD+25, and with the current evolution, ATHENA has taken steps to reflect on the leadership and representation of adolescent girls and young women within its leadership and governance spaces outside of the network’s day-to-day management. Being true to ourselves and our feminist power we, collectively co-created the existence of the adolescent girls and young women governance board. We see the young women’s advisory board as a final piece of the coming to life of the network’s governance and true self-representation for the constituency we seek to serve.
About ATHENA’s Young Women’s Governance Board
ATHENA’s young women’s advisory board comprises five phenomenal young feminist leaders spread across Eastern, Western and Southern Africa. The board members come with local, regional, and global experience working on SRHR, HIV, gender equality, women and girls empowerment. The board members are committed to a world where the human rights of girls and young women are fulfilled and creating a world where girls and young women can thrive free from harm and intersecting inequalities. Their passion and track record cement our belief that adolescent girls and young women can be conscientious leaders. The responsibilities of the governance board are to provide oversight, strategic guidance, and direction to the network as we pave our way towards a feminist future include; Specifically, their roles are envisioned to be;
Provide oversight and strategic guidance and direction to ATHENA Network on leadership, program strategy, and operations in general.
Champion and advance the representation and profiling ATHENA Network in various spaces
Support with resource mobilization
Guide and provide oversight to the network in our next chapter of growth, expansion, and feminist journey
Provide advice on organizational development
Guide ATHENA Network to operationalize ideas, concepts, and strategic ways of engaging adolescent girls and young women in program design
Meet our Young Women’s Governance Board members.
Ulemu Hannah Kanyongolo: Malawi
Ulemu is a lawyer and activist. She is an avid reader, researcher and writer who has published work that engages the politics of gender, development, and law. Her publications include Beijing and its Platform for Action, then and now. A view from a young feminist in Malawi. She is passionate about spotlighting human rights issues that affect people globally and committed to contributing to affecting meaningful changes. Ulemu founded the Young Feminists Network, a network of young Malawian feminists who advocate for gender equality and social justice. Between 2016 and 2018, she served as the chairperson of the Gender Justice Clinic at the University of Malawi. In 2019, she took part in Oxfam and Amnesty International’s global strategy processes as a youth representative. She is currently a board member of PEPETA Malawi, the Malawian chapter of a collective of young Afrikan feminists advocating for social justice. She is also the chairperson of Malawi Women Human Rights Defenders in the Southern Africa Region.
Iwatutu Joyce Adewole: Nigeria
Iwatutu is an activist who is passionate about creating safe communities for women and girls through policy advocacy, information dissemination and community building. She works with youth-led organisations to develop responsive policies and evidence-based programs, interventions and support for sexual and reproductive health and rights, HIV/AIDS, malaria and TB. Her work also seeks to ensure that the interventions include gender mainstreaming, social inclusion and advocating for human rights. She is currently serving as the Youth Program Manager for the United Nations Population Fund Youth Participatory Platform and leads the global Resource and Partnership Mobilization working group of The PACT for youth in the AIDS response.
Hazel Jojo: Zimbabwe
Hazel is an activist with a degree in social work and training in social accountability monitoring for adolescent girls and young women’s sexual reproductive health with SAFAIDS. She is passionate about advocating for and empowering young and adolescent girls. Her politics rose from a place of vulnerability and have manifested in her commitment to amplifying the voices of other girls and the need to share their experiences. She is committed to advocating for gender equality and contributing towards building a world where girls are respected, listened to and treated equally. Hazel worked at Ignite Youth Organization as the program leader for the girls’ initiative and won the prize for the best project supporting girls. Currently, she is the lead host of the Red Couch Talk show at the Women’s Coalition of Zimbabwe, where she uses the platform to raise awareness about issues that affect young women. She is serving the Executive Women’s Alliance of Zimbabwe as a member and the Youth Empowerment and Transformation Trust as a Board Member, and the secretary of the Nerve Center: Education Plus Initiative. She is working on a project called the “Hold her hand” that seeks to advocate for a comprehensive Education Act for teenage mothers who go back to school to ensure that they are free from the fear of being discriminated against and have access to sexual and reproductive health services.
Juliet Joslyn Amoli: Uganda
Juliet is an activist with a Bachelor’s in Arts degree. She is passionate about advocating for improved access to sexual reproductive health and rights services for adolescent girls and young women. Juliet was the 2017-2018 ATHENA LEARN ambassador and an alumna for the 2019 American Medical Women’s Association cohort and the 2020 Feminist Perspective cohort on sexual and reproductive health. She currently works as a community monitor under the Community-Led Monitoring program for the International Community of Women Living with HIV Eastern Africa, a regional advocacy network that raises awareness about women living with HIV in Eastern Africa. She is the co-founder of the Inclusive Sports Initiative that aims to promote a generation active in sports to improve health and wellbeing. She is a consultant for Nile Source of Hope, an organization that aims to empower young women with skills development and she volunteers as an assistant coordinator at Coalition On Girls’ Empowerment.
Bahati Thomas Haule: Tanzania
Bahati is an activist who is passionate about raising awareness about the vulnerabilities and experiences of women living with HIV. She is the programme officer at Dignity and Wellbeing of Women living with HIV Tanzania, a member of the International Community of Women Living with HIV Eastern Africa and a community representative at the African Community Advisory Board.
