Meet the Authors
Cynthia Eyakuze
Cynthia Eyakuze is the Co-Vice President of the Global Program at the Equality Fund. She has over 25 years of experience in human rights, women’s rights, sexual and reproductive health and rights, and governance and accountability. She is a skilled and innovative strategist with expertise in advocacy, program development and delivery, and philanthropy.
She led the Open Society Foundation (OSF) Women’s Rights Program from 2014-2017, which focused on advancing women’s sexual and reproductive rights, promoting economic justice for women and strengthening women’s rights organizations and movements. Before joining OSF, Cynthia directed the Francophone Africa Program at Family Care International, an NGO based in New York, overseeing programs on HIV/AIDS, adolescent sexual and reproductive health and maternal health in West Africa. She holds an MA in French from Bryn Mawr College, and an MPH from Columbia University.
Prior to joining the Equality Fund, Cynthia worked as an independent consultant with public and private foundations, academic programs and not for profit organizations on strategy, program development and assessment. Clients have included the Black Feminist Fund, Ford Foundation, Columbia University School of Public Health, Urgent Action Fund, the Stop TB Partnership, and The Global Fund for AIDS, TB and Malaria.
Awa Fall Diop
Awa Fall-Diop is a Pan-Africanist feminist activist, anti-colonialist, anti-imperialist and Senegalese political actor. In 1997, she created the Observatory of Gender Relations in Senegal (ORGENS) for the establishment of gender equality in the educational system. This led to her election as an Ashoka changemaker. As a trade unionist, she has contributed to the systematization and satisfaction of specific demands of working women such as the right to pay for the medical expenses of their children and spouses. Awa works for women's rights based on an analysis and a questioning of patriarchy and contributes to their advancement as with the law instituting parity, the law against rape and pedophilia, etc. Her work as a popular educator and activist supports the construction and strengthening of social transformation movements in Africa. Awa also works to build intergenerational bridges in the feminist movement. In Thiès, (Senegal), she creates a space of refuge, rest and regeneration for feminists.
Maie Panaga Babker
Since 2014, Maie has been devoted to feminist knowledge production in Arabic, covering areas of: feminism, sexuality, and feminist Internet. Maie is the co-founder and co-editor of Ikhtyar Feminist Collective. “Ikhtyar” meaning choice in Arabic, aims to promote and educate the community on gender and sexual equality.
Yannia Sofía Garzón Valencia
As a Black Woman and community weaver, Yannia has worked for nine years in Colombia with the Process of Black Communities. Between 2013 and 2017, she invested her time into coordinating and facilitating several youth and women’s training spaces. The mobilization of black women for the care of life and ancestral territories remains among her largest schools of political training.
Yannia has been a part of the methodological and negotiation teams of the Black movement and the popular movement, and she is also a workshop leader and lecturer in numerous local, national and international spaces. She has centered her interests in the organizational processes of Black women who propose and conduct anti-racist and political realities and practices centered on the care of life.
Timiebi Souza-Okpofabri
Timiebi is a writer, archivist and DJ from Trinidad and Tobago. Over the last few years, they have worked as a researcher and consultant, focusing on challenging the erasure of historical narratives of resistance through archives, storytelling, art and education. They are a co-founder of Batti Mamzelle, Trinidad and Tobago’s first queer DJ collective. Outside of work, they love hiking and the outdoors, making music and reading stories from the Caribbean, Africa and the diaspora.