The Advocacy Accelerator (AAC) is pleased to host the first of our three-part “Advocacy Conversations” webinar series on funding and the practice of advocacy. During this series, the AAC will present insights from its recent survey on the impact of COVID-19 on the practice of advocacy.

Register here.

Meet our Panellists:

Jeggan Grey-Johnson works with the Open Society Foundations’ Africa Regional Office (AfRO).  He led the Anti-Corruption Cluster of Open Society Foundations’ (OSF) Africa regional office and is a founding member of the Multi Sectoral Working Group Against Corruption. He led the campaign with the Pan-African Parliament that ushered in the African Charter on Democracy, Elections and Governance in 2012. Jeggan was the focal point on an 11-country study aimed at influencing policy reforms on media legislative frameworks. He has overseen several publications, including: Effectiveness of Anti-Corruption Commissions; Effectiveness of Election Management Bodies; reviews of the African Peer Review Mechanism; Political Participation and Democracy; and Delivery of Public Services in Education. He is currently part of the AfRO Advocacy team.

The Open Society Foundations, founded by George Soros, are the world’s largest private funder of independent groups working for justice, democratic governance, and human rights. We provide thousands of grants every year through a network of national and regional foundations and offices, funding a vast array of projects—many of them now shaped by the challenges of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Jean Kemitare is a Ugandan feminist currently working as the Programmes Director at Urgent Action Fund – Africa responsible for strategic leadership and programme implementation. Previously she worked as Program Manager for the GBV Prevention Network at Raising Voices. She has worked in the gender equality & violence against women & girls (VAWG) field for over ten years. Prior to that she was engaged in chronic poverty research and policy advocacy where her advocacy efforts contributed to the development of a Social Protection Policy in Uganda. She has authored a range of methodologies approaches and articles including the Get Moving! Process for strengthening capacity of individuals and organisations addressing GBV.

Urgent Action Fund-Africa provides rapid response and advocacy (strategic) grants to support unanticipated, time-sensitive, innovative and bold initiatives. These grants enable African feminist and women’s rights activists, organisations and movements to seize windows of opportunity, fracture patriarchy, amplify their voices, enhance their visibility, and become significant actors who can influence policy and law while shaping discourse. This way, UAF-Africa fills a unique grant-making niche within the African feminist movement, providing steppingstones to activists as they use their agency and resilience to achieve social, economic, political and environmental justice.

George Mwai is a Programme Manager at UHAI EASHRI, Africa’s first indigenous activist fund supporting sexual and gender minorities and sex worker human rights. It has funded critical court challenges that overturned repressive laws, resourced pioneering community-led HIV clinics, and supported communities to document their lives, organising and advocacy.

Established in 2009, and based in Nairobi, UHAI funds activist organising in 7 Eastern African countries—Burundi, Democratic Republic of Congo, Ethiopia, Kenya, Rwanda, Tanzania and Uganda—and Pan-African organisations working across the continent. From funding to capacity building to research to convening, UHAI supports efforts that build knowledge, effectiveness, accountability, sustainability, and integrity in our communities.

Claire Mathonsi is the Deputy Executive Director at the Advocacy Accelerator. She is an African feminist with extensive experience in women’s rights and gender equality in a global context with direct experience across Asia, Anglophone and Francophone Africa, Eastern Europe and Latin America & the Caribbean. Throughout her career, she has worked in diverse sectors at national, regional and global level.

Claire has comprehensive insight and practical exposure across gender in the context of SRHR, HIV, governance, economic transformation and all forms of gender based violence (GBV) and its linkages to key issues related to gender equality.  She has worked as the Global Technical Advisor: Gender & Gender Based Violence Advisor at the International HIV/AIDS Alliance, was a founding member of the African Women’s Rights Collective (AWRC), was the co-Chair of the United Kingdom DFID PPA Learning Group on Gender, was on the Steering Committee Member for Women4GlobalFund and is currently the Chairperson of Access Chapter 2.