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2019 Tutu Fellow Akintunde Oyebode has been appointed as the Commissioner for Finance and Economic Development for Etiki State in Nigeria. He was sworn in by the State Governor, Kayode Fayemi, following a cabinet reshuffle. Akin has played several senior roles in Ekiti state government, with this now being his most senior role.

Akin was previously the Special Adviser on Investment, Trade and Innovation at Ekiti State government, where he was responsible for leading the state government’s efforts to make Ekiti an attractive destination for investors and innovation-driven enterprises. An additional element to that portfolio had been creating jobs for young people.

2009 Tutu Fellow James Mwangi has penned a thought piece on insights and lessons that can be gained from the COVID-19 pandemic. James is the Executive Director of the Dalberg Group, and a Partner with Dalberg Advisors. James cautions that while “COVID-19 is the defining socio-economic and geo-political event of our lives to date – it may not be the last major disruption.” In his piece, he emphasises the importance of both action and reflection.

He points to the social fault lines the pandemic has exposed and warns that the existential issues of climate change and profound inequality—and their explosive nexus—remain ahead of us. It holds the promise, he says, that if ignored, of disruptions that will dwarf the current catastrophe.

The governance committee of African Risk Capacity Limited has appointed 2014 Tutu Fellow Ladé Araba to join its Board of Directors. Ladé is the Managing Director for Africa at Convergence Finance. She is also the Co-Founder and President of the Visiola Foundation, which empowers African girls and young women through education, training, and mentoring in the science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) fields.  Also appointed to the board was Sarata Kone-Thiam.

African Risk Capacity (ARC) is a specialized agency of the African Union that was established to help African governments improve their capacities to better plan, prepare, and respond to extreme weather events and natural disasters.

Two Tutu Fellows, Lai Yahaya and Moji Rhodes, have been appointed as Special Advisors to Nigerian President Muhammadu Buhari.  Lai is a 2009 Fellow and Moji a 2014 Fellow.

Lai was appointed as a Senior Special Advisor to the President handling Strategy and Planning, while Moji was appointed as a Special Advisor handling Social Development and Humanitarian Affairs. Their appointments were announced in August 2020.

2013 Tutu Fellow Ifeoma Malo has been awarded the Power Industry Leader of the Year at the prestigious Nigerian African Power, Energy and Water Industry Awards. 

Ify is the Nigerian Campaign Director for Power for All, a global decentralized renewable campaign organization. She is also the founder and CEO of Clean Tech Hub and the Energy Innovation Center in Abuja. She was the immediate past Senior Policy Adviser on Energy Policies, Regulations and Partnerships to the Minister of Power in Nigeria and advised on the policy direction for large-scale grid-connected and off-grid power.

Investec’s Women Behind the Mask initiative is a series of robust conversations which showcases women making a difference, and how women can help other women to move South Africa forward.  In this second edition of the webcast series, 2016 Fellow Cumesh Moodliar, who is the Head of Private Banking at Investec, chaired a panel of women who are leaders in banking and financial markets. They discussed the impact that women in leadership had had on decisions made during lockdown for COVID-19.

The panel comprised Fundi Tshazibana, the Deputy Governor at the Reserve Bank; Tertia Jacobs, a Treasury Economist at Investec Bank SA;  Leila Fourie, the Group CEO of the Johannesburg Stock Exchange; Rene van Zyl, a Tax & Fiduciary Specialist at Investec Wealth & Investment; and Ruth Leas, the CEO of Investec Bank UK.

BBC Radio has celebrated the 60th Anniversary of its Focus on Africa programme, and as part of its look back, it interviewed 2015 Tutu Fellow, Uduak Amimo.

In the interview, Uduak discussed joining the BBC's Africa service in 2002 and having to cover hostilities in Sudan, Nigeria and other countries.  When she became a senior producer and presenter on Focus on Africa it was a time when the Lord's Resistance Army (LRA) insurgency was being waged in Uganda.The LRA was a cult-like movement that initiated conflict in northern Uganda, South Sudan, the Central African Republic and the Democratic Republic of Congo.  The insurgency was accused of human rights violations and the use of child soldiers.

The African Leadership Institute's Project Pakati launched its report titled The Greater Inclusion of African Youth in Public Service and Governance on August 12, International Youth Day 2020. The report is part of an ongoing partnership between the African Leadership Institute and the African Union Office of the Youth Envoy, to shift young Africans to the centre of the African development narrative. These efforts are being funded by a grant from the Ford Foundation.

The focus of this report is less on making the self-evident case for the need for young people to operate in governance and the policy realm, but rather on how progress can be accelerated and how African Union member states can achieve greater youth inclusion in public service and government.

2007 Tutu Fellow Niven Postma has launched her book If you don't do politics, politics will do you...A guide to navigating office politics effectively and ethically (And yes, it is possible.)  Her publication seeks to raise awareness on what office politics actually are, and how being politically intelligent is the single biggest determinant of personal and professional success. The book was launched on 04 August 2020.

Niven reveals that you can use politics to advance your career, benefit your team and build the organisation you are part of.  She points out that politics needn't be unethical, unpleasant and unfair as most people perceive it, so so they shouldn't be avoided.

Several Tutu Leadership Programme alumni have been named in this year’s 100 Most Influential African Women list, which is published annually by Avance Media. They are Elsie Kanza, Ndidi Nwuneli, and Mimi Kalinda.

The prestigious listing is presented as a ranking of the 100 most influential African women, providing a summary of women who have climbed the corporate ladder, started their own businesses, or have been at the forefront of decision-making both locally and internationally.  The criteria for selection include excellence in leadership and performance, personal accomplishments, commitment to sharing knowledge, breaking the status quo, and being an accomplished African woman. The listing was released in August, to coincide with Women's Month.

2007 Tutu Fellow Ipeleng Mkhari is the Founder and CEO of Motseng Investment Holdings which partnered with Malani Padayachee and Associates (MPA) to acquire 100% equity of Mott MacDonald Africa, a South African engineering entity, to create South Africa’s largest black and women owned consulting engineering company.  Ipeleng will be the Chairperson of the new entity, MPAMOT, which has the potential to become a beacon for women in an industry that continues to be male dominated.

Another Tutu Fellow, Kunyalala Maphisa,  was the Lead Advisor on the transaction. Kunya is a 2006 Tutu Fellow and the Principal Partner at Brighton Wealth as well as the President of the Black Women's Association of South Africa, BWASA.

It is clear that we are living in exceptional and unprecedented times. The COVID-19 pandemic has disrupted our ways of working and interacting and, naturally, AFLI has also been impacted. This post provides some sense of the impact of the pandemic and its implications on the Tutu Fellowship Programme.

When the effects of the pandemic were starting to be felt in March 2020, we had just completed the process of selecting our 2020 Archbishop Tutu Leadership Associates. We carried the news of that announcement here in our News.

In an insightful African Business Magazine article, 2019 Tutu Fellow, Ronak Golpaldas examines the opportunities the global pandemic has presented the African continent with. He goes on to unpack four areas that present the greatest opportunities, namely, in healthcare, public-private collaboration, economic diversification; and regional cooperation.

Ronak Gopaldas is a political economist, “pracademic”, writer and speaker. His work focuses on the intersection of politics, economics and business in Africa. He stresses the importance of finding opportunity in crisis. In his piece, he notes that, “it is important not to lose sight of how these disruptions can be used to catalyse significant behavioural, business and governance improvements and leave lasting legacy benefits.”

2018 Tutu Fellow Jean-Guy Afrika has been appointed as the Chief Regional Funds Co-ordinator at the African Development Bank. In this role, he is responsible for the African Trade Fund’s (AfTRA) strategic planning and its overall management. This includes the monitoring and reporting of the operational performance of the Fund.

Jean-Guy is a public policy expert with deep specialization in trade, regional integration, and strategic planning and execution at the African Development Bank. He has coordinated efforts to develop two of the Bank’s most pioneering policy/analytical instruments - the Africa Regional Integration Index; and the Visa Openness Index.

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.