Nuestro Equipo

Abdoul Aziz Soumare is passionate about leadership and personal development.  Both altruistic and philanthropic, Mr Soumare studied International Business. While pursuing his studies, he joined AIESEC which is a global platform entirely run by youth for youth to develop their leadership potential through international internships and volunteer opportunities.

During 5 years as Talent Manager and then Organization Development Manager, he had to develop several training tools, train hundreds of young people on leadership and entrepreneurship skills and implement AIESEC in 3 universities in Sénégal.

Mr Soumare joined Ashoka Sahel in June 2017 as a Community Management intern, then consultant in communication before taking the role of Fellowship and Changemakers Community Manager.  Currently, Abdoul Aziz is Youth Program Manager at Ashoka Sahel.

Dadisai Taderera joins Ashoka as the Venture and Fellowship Manager for Southern Africa. She has worked for over a decade supporting change makers and communities to advocate for transparency and accountability to ensure a more equal and just society. She has worked with organisations such as Global Integrity, Open Society Foundation of South Africa and Accountability Lab among others. She was a founding member of the Right2Know campaign in 2010 a movement centred on freedom of expression and access to information. She was born and raised in Zimbabwe but currently lives in Johannesburg where she is also raising two children and hopefully future change makers.

Mbali Gushu (Zondi) was born and raised in Pietermaritzburg, on the East Coast of South Africa. She was selected to be a part of the inaugural class of the African Leadership Academy for outstanding leadership potential and academic promise. She attended Barnard College of Columbia University in New York studying Economics. Mbali has worked in the media industry abroad at NBC Universal and as a writer for business lifestyle magazine, DESTINY. She believes in the transformative power of social innovation and knows this will make great strides to positively developing the African continent. For the past 5 years Mbali has worked in education in Africa as Country Coordinator for ThinkImpact; heading up South Africa recruitment at Nova Pioneer Schools and as the Africa, Chief of Staff at Teach For All.

Okey is a global Leadership Group Member of Ashoka and currently leads the Youth Years strategy in Africa. In the last year, he has been establishing and co-leading strategic partnerships with government, faculties of education, publishers, education unions and the media, towards a movement that creates an enabling environment for young people to feel, act, and thrive as changemakers. Okey has been a pioneer in justice reform, security reform, and social transformation at the national and regional levels in West Africa for 15 years. Previously, he led the ECOWAS Commission reform program in improving transparency, accountability, effectiveness, and people participation in security decision making. He has supported regional policy formulation, parliamentary capacity building, knowledge sharing, and forging multilateral and multisector partnerships. He is the Founder of EduTrust Foundation and Ofala Publishers Ltd. A lawyer and Master’s degree holder in Conflict, Security and Development from King’s College London, Okey loves to write, to teach, and to capture beautiful moments of joy and wonder through poetry and travel photography.

Paula Ugwu is passionate about food security, poverty alleviation, youth and female empowerment, and has contributed to academic researches that inform knowledge on the role of African women in agriculture and the pricing system of agricultural produce on the Italian Commodity Exchange market.

Moreover, she possesses a Master of Science degree in Agricultural and Food Economics and has over five years of work experience in diverse areas including, but not limited to Program Management, Project Management, Partnerships, Human Resources and Retail Management.

Currently, she leads the Transforming Children and Youth Years program in Anglophone West Africa and supports Partnerships in Africa. In this capacity, she is identifying and supporting young changemakers in the region to increase visibility and social impact of their work while positioning them for success through collaborative partnerships.

Sarah Mujulizi joined Ashoka in 2019 as the Knowledge and Communications Associate at the Africa Hub in Lagos, Nigeria. She brings on board years of experience providing strategies, community engagement, content management and project management skills. In her previous roles, she delivered strategic media and communication solutions to a niche market of development actors in government, not-for-profit organizations, and international bodies like the United Nations and the African Union. Sarah is currently serving as the Fellowship and Partnership Associate for Ashoka in Africa and the Program Manager for the Accelerating Climate Change Solutions in Africa project. Sarah is working to amplify Ashoka's 'Everyone a Changemaker' vision in Africa.

Stéphanie joined Ashoka Africa Leadership team since September 2017, after 13 years with Ashoka on different continents: at the Global Headquarters in the US, Mexico City and Paris. Stephanie is leading the launch of the “Changemaker Company” initiative in Africa to create more bridges between the corporate world and social entrepreneurs and engage businesses in developing their full changemaker potential. Stéphanie is also an international evaluator for the selection of new Ashoka Fellows and a board member of Ashoka Romania. She started her carrier in management consulting with Deloitte in Paris, and Boston, before joining World Relief in Rwanda for 2 years as program director where she supported the launch of Ikirezi, a social enterprise producing essential oils with rural communities led by Ashoka Fellow Nicolas Hitimana. Stephanie was born and raised in France and holds an MBA degree from ESSEC Business School in Paris. She is a mother of 3.