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Two Tutu Fellows are featured extensively in an article in TechCabal by Eghosa Omoigui, the managing partner at EchoVC Partners.  The article, titled Nudges and shoves : Tackling venture capital bias in Africa, deals with how historic inequalities are impacting venture capital investment in Africa.  The two Fellows mentioned extensively in the piece are Swaady Martin, a 2002 Fellow, and Ada Osakwe, who was in the Class of 2014. 

Eghosa begins his piece by offering an explanation of how prosperity happens, then qualifies it by saying that unfortunately, economics cannot presume rational actors.  The playing field, he says, is skewed, and this impacts how investors pattern match when making decisions on where to invest.

Two Tutu Fellows have been named to this year’s 100 Most Reputable Africans by Reputation Poll International. The two are 2008 Fellow, Elsie Kanza, and 2010 Fellow and AFLI CEO, Jackie Chimhanzi.  The annual Poll lists 100 Africans who are celebrated for their good governance, leadership, and a range of other criteria. 

The two Fellows are joined by a range of luminaries that include two African presidents and a number of policymakers. The selection criteria are integrity, visibility and impact.

2013 Tutu Fellow January Makamba has written a moving tribute for the late Tanzanian President, Mzee Mkapa, who died in July 2020. The tribute is a heartfelt and poetic portrait of a graceful leader, and the leadership he inspired in January and many others. Poignantly, he writes that, “Mkapa taught me that prominence is good when it comes to you, not when you seek it.”

January Makamba is a political leader, a former cabinet minister, and a Member of Parliament for the Bumbuli constituency. 

2019 Tutu Fellow Sangu Delle's  company has opened a new Rabito Clinic in Accra, Ghana.  Sangu's company, Africa Health Holdings, opened the clinic in East Legon in July. 

The services the clinic will provide include general medicine, dermatology, urology, gynecology, physiotherapy and speech and language therapy.  Rabito Clinic’s main area of practice is in dermatology, offering a wide range of treatments for patients with skin problems, including acne, autoimmune and connective tissue disease, HIV-related skin disorders, moles, melanoma surveillance, pigmentation disorders, wound and ulcer care, and more.

2016 Archbishop Tutu Fellow Dorothy Ghettuba has been interviewed by CNN on how she is growing streaming viewership in Africa and bringing more African stories to the lineup.  Film and television productions worldwide have been negatively impacted by COVID-19, but the Kenyan Netflix executive has said that she is using this time to find the best stories, to make the best use of the interruption.

At the same time, for international streaming giant Netflix, lockdowns have translated into nearly 16 million new paid subscribers in the first quarter of 2020 alone, followed by another 10 million during the second quarter. 

2014 Tutu Fellow Sello Hatang - the CEO of the Nelson Mandela Foundation - secured the United Nations Secretary-General, António Guterres, to deliver the 18th Nelson Mandela Annual Lecture on the theme: Tackling the inequality pandemic: A new social contract for a new era. 

Hosted by the Nelson Mandela Foundation in partnership with the UN, the event took place virtually on 18 July 2020. Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the lecture was, for the first time, an online-only event, delivered at the UN headquarters in New York City.

2006 Tutu Fellow Kunyalala Maphisa has been appointed to the Council of the University of Cape Town. The appointment, which was made by the Minister of Higher Education, Bonginkosi (Blade) Nzimande, was made on 19 June 2020.  UCT Council members typically serve for four years.  Under the law governing the university, the Minister is entitled to appoint up to five people to the Council and the council's members recently began their 2020-2024 stint. 

The Council governs the university and its responsibilities include determining the mission, objectives, goals, strategies and policies for the progress of the institution. Kunyalala is a UCT alumnus, obtaining both her undergraduate and graduate degrees from the university.

2014 Tutu Fellow Ada Osakwe delivered the convocation address to the Kellogg School of Management Class of 2020. She became the first African to be given this honour, and the fourth black woman. She followed in the footsteps of outstanding Black Americans Edith Cooper, the Global Head of Human Capital at Goldman Sachs in 2017; Roslyn Brock, the Chairman Emeritus of the NAACP in 2012; and media titan Oprah Winfrey, in 2011.

Ada is an award-winning food entrepreneur and Founder of The Nuli Juice Company and an alumnus of the Kellogg School.

2008 Tutu Fellow Eunice Ajambo has drafted a United Nations policy brief titled COVID-19: An Emerging Development Challenge, but opportunity for the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) in Namibia.  The policy brief examines economic transformation in the context of COVID-19 and analyses how Namibia is currently fairing. It provides a socio-economic impact assessment for short, medium- and long-term recommendations in addressing COVID-19. She makes the point that crises can be an opportunity to prioritize economic transformation.

Eunice is the Economic Affairs Officer with the Macroeconomics and Governance Division of the UN Economic Commission for Africa.  Her work on economic policy spans economic governance, development finance, and public sector management.

The former Executive Director of the African Leadership Institute and 2007 Fellow, Tracey Webster, has been appointed CEO of the Oppenheimer Memorial Trust.  Prior to her appointment, she had been the CEO of The Enterpriseroom, a specialist consultancy that helps governments and companies develop and implement sustainable transformation programmes.  The aim of her company was to advance small and medium-sized-black-owned businesses as well as encourage youth employment. 

The Oppenheimer Memorial trust was founded in 1958 by the late Harry Oppenheimer to honour the memory of his father, Sir Ernest. It has had a long tradition of investing in education, public interest activities and other philanthropic causes in order to make a positive difference to South African society. In 2012, the Oppenheimer family donated an additional sum of R1 billion to the Trust.

A piece by 2016 Tutu Fellow Victoria Ibezim-Ohaeri titled COVID-19 and the shrinking civic space in Nigeria has been published in Just Security. Victoria is the founder and director of research and policy at Spaces for Change, a non-profit organization based in Nigeria that conducts research and advocacy that includes a focus on defending the civic space.

Victoria's piece examines how the coronavirus pandemic is being used as a cover to shrink civic in the name of 'national security'.  With people's attention on public health, what is being missed is the more worrying concern that state actors are exploiting the pandemic to stifle dissent, clamp down on civic freedoms, and push through restrictive measures, using COVID-19 as a pretext.

2013 Tutu Fellow Catherine Constantinides asks deeper questions about everyday active citizenry and what it looks like at the level of the individual and the community in a South African context. She gave her TEDx Talk, which she called Active Citizenship 101, at TEDx Waterfall Drive in May 2020.  Informed by her vast experience as a social activist on the African continent, as an international climate activist, and human rights defender, she challenges ideas about active citizenry and what it means to be agents of change. She begins her talk by saying the biggest mistake one can make is to do nothing because one can do only a little.

The talk was at a TEDx event and used the TED conference format but was independently organized by the local community.

Olugbenga Adesida, an AFLI Director and Trustee, and a 2018 Tutu Fellow, Geci Karuri-Sebina, have written a powerful post in which they call for using COVID-19 as a global opportunity to shift the global economic paradigm. The times are urgent, they say, and the needs globally mutual. The article was published in The Daily Maverick in May 2020. 

COVID-19 is a rude awakening for the world, and they write it has laid bare for the world to see the underlying problems of the current paradigm. "It highlights the unsustainability of the current systems and the need for change – from the US with the biggest economy, to the smallest most fragile economies in Africa.”

2014 Tutu Fellow Sello Hatang mobilised the Nelson Mandela Foundation when it became apparent that South Africa would be facing a massive humanitarian crisis. Along with The Kolisi Foundation and the Imbumba Foundation, by the end of April his foundation had set up Each One Feed One with a start-up contribution of R500 000 from its own funds as an emergency relief vehicle, focusing on food security. It shortly thereafter began delivering food to starving people around the country. 

Sello was also joined by 2013 Tutu Fellow Catherine Constantinides, who is an ambassador to the Each One Feed One programme.

Unlocking Africa's Business Potential by 2015 Tutu Fellow Landry Signé has recently been released and has had good feedback and editorial reviews. Landry makes the case that Africa welcomes business investment and offers some of the world's highest returns and impacts.  The book examines business opportunities in the eight sectors with the highest potential returns on private investment in Africa.  These sectors include: consumer markets, agriculture and agri-processing, information and communication technology, manufacturing, oil and gas, tourism, banking, and infrastructure and construction.

He says Africa is one of the world's fastest growing regions and by 2030 will be home to nearly $1.7 billion people and an estimated $6.7 trillion in consumer and business spending.  Landry is a prolific writer and thinker, having authored or co-authored more than 27 manuscripts, books, articles and book chapters, with several books dealing with Africa's economy.