People
Details of our directors, staff, trustees, researchers and interns are given below.
Directors
Dr Alex de Waal
Alex de Waal
Alex de Waal, the HIV/AIDS Programme Director, is a well-known and respected writer and activist on Africa. His books include ‘Famine that Kills: Darfur, Sudan’, ‘Famine Crimes: Politics and the Disaster Relief Industry in Africa’ and a number of books for Justice Africa - see our publications section. Alex served as Associate Director of Africa Watch before resigning in 1992 in protest over the U.S. military intervention in Somalia. He was a founder and director of African Rights, Chairman of Mines Advisory Group 1993-8 (co-laureate of the 1997 Nobel Peace Prize), and director of programmes for the International African Institute. After successfully lobbying the United Nations to establish a Commission on HIV/AIDS and Governance in Africa (CHGA), Alex acted as this body’s founding Programme Director, and contributed to the direction and purpose of the body 2003-2004. Alex established and continues to coordinate the African Civil Society Governance and AIDS Initiative (GAIN), largely as a civil society complement to the CHGA process; and Justice Africa remains a centre for the production and commissioning of some of the newest and most relevant research on the social, political and governance effects of HIV/AIDS in Africa. Since September 2004, Alex has combined his director role with being Programme Director of the Social Science Research Council (US) Programme on HIV/AIDS and Social Transformations, and a Fellow at the Global Equity Initiative, Harvard University.
Dr Tajudeen Abdul-Raheem
Tajudeen
Abdul-Raheem
Tajudeen Abdul-Raheem, the Peace and Security Programme Director, has spear-headed Justice Africa’s engagement with the African Union since its founding in 2002; positioning Justice Africa as a incisive civil society voice within that body and its constituent organs, as well as acting as a forum and conduit between civil society and the African Union generally. As a Pan-African representative body committed to development and democracy, we also engage with the African Union to support its purpose and to ensure its further success. As well as his work with the AU, Tajudeen has maintained his role as General Secretary of the Pan-African Movement; Chairman of the Centre for Democracy and Development, based in Abuja and Lagos; and of the Pan-African Development Education and Advocacy Programme (PADEAP) based in Kampala and Abuja. In addition to this, Tajudeen continues to produce the weekly Thursday Postcard, a column on African issues that is accessed by millions in Africa and globally, and that is carried in Newsday (Nigeria), The New Vision (Uganda) and on Pambazuka News. Tajudeen will be spending 2006/07 based in Nairobi, acting as Deputy Director (Africa) for the United Nations Millennium Campaign; ensuring that civil society voices continue to be heard in the global effort against poverty and injustice.
Yohannes Ajawin
Yohannes Ajawin
Yohannes is a Sudanese citizen and prominent human rights activist. He trained in law at the University of Khartoum, he was a judge and a democracy activist who played a leading role in the peaceful uprising that ended the military regime of President Nimeiri in 1985. From 1986-9 he was spokesman for the Union of Sudan African Parties in the Sudanese parliament, serving briefly as Minister for Legal Affairs, Information and Public Service before the 1989 military coup. After a year as a prisoner of conscience courtesy of the incoming military dictatorship, Yohannes left Sudan and became a human rights and peace activist with African Rights, later serving as Sudan Programme director for InterAfrica Group.
Programme Staff
Hafiz Mohammed Sudan Programme hafiz@justiceafrica.org
Hafiz Mohammed
Hafiz, as well as our financial controller, now runs our new programme, which exists within our larger Sudan programme, on Darfur from London and Khartoum. Originally from Kordorfan, Hafiz has become a recognised authority on the politics and history of the Darfur conflict; and regularly contributes to television, radio and print interviews, as well as advising donors, governments and Sudanese stakeholders on the ongoing crisis in Darfur.
Alastair
Roderick
Alastair coordinates the African Civil Society Governance and AIDS Initiative (GAIN), and manages Justice Africa’s research programmes on HIV/AIDS in Africa, in coordination with several partners, including the University of Cape Town and Makerere University, Kampala. His research interests focus on the social aspects of HIV/AIDS, particularly concerning children, violent conflict, the epidemic in West Africa, and the socio-ecological effects of HIV/AIDS.
Trustees
Richard Dowden, Royal African Society
Richard is Director of the Royal African Society, and a long-standing and noted commentator on the politics of Africa; having previously been the Africa editor of The Economist. Richard also sits on the board of the African Arguments series of books published by Zed Books, which is jointly produced by Justice Africa.
Christine Tominke Olaniyan, PADEAP
Christine is Programme Director of the Pan-African Development Education and Advocacy Programme (PADEAP). Christine currently works between London and the PADEAP Community Information centres in Kampala (Uganda) and Funtua (Nigeria).
Sulaiman Rahal
Suleiman is Director of Nuba Survival, a Sudanese advocacy group, and Editor-in-Chief of the Nuba Vision newsletter. An epidemiologist by training, Suleiman has been devoted in the last decades to promoting the cause of these marginalised people, and campaigning for greater human rights in Sudan.
Researchers & Associates
Jacob Bor HIV/AIDS and Democracy in South Africa
Jon Harle JA website; HIV/AIDS and education
Ephraim Kimotho HIV/AIDS and Parliamentarians in Kenya
Kintu Nyago HIV/AIDS Activists in Uganda
Roxanna Rawson HIV/AIDS and Systems
Charles Wendo HIV/AIDS and the Press in Uganda
Project on HIV/AIDS in the Police and Other Uniformed Services
- Themba Masuku (South Africa)
- Fatima Elsheikh (Sudan)
- Alison Thompson(Sierra Leone)
- Darcel Gabriel-Nelson(Benin)
Current Interns
Hannah Logan HIV/AIDS and Peace and Security in the Nuba Mountains
Kady Kourouma Nomadic Conflicts and Peace Building in Mali
Pooja Naidu HIV/AIDS in Sudan and Socio-Political Contexts
Sigrun Marie Moss Oil in Sudan
