Bisi Adeleye-Fayemi is a Feminist Activist, Gender Specialist, Social Entrepreneur, Policy Advocate, and Writer. She has a BA (1984) and MA (1988) in History from the University of Ife, Nigeria (now Obafemi Awolowo University). She also received an MA in Gender and Society (1992) from Middlesex University, UK.
She co-founded the African Women’s Development Fund, (AWDF) – the first Africa-wide grant-making foundation for women, and served as the first Executive Director from 2001-2010. She is currently Principal Partner, Amandla Consulting, specializing in leadership development for women, and she runs an online community called Abovewhispers.com. She was until recently, a UN Women Nigeria Senior Advisor, and is a Visiting Senior Research Fellow at the Africa Leadership Center, King’s College, London.
She serves on the Executive Boards of the African Women’s Development Fund, and the Global Fund for Women USA where she chairs the Program Committee. She is Chair of the Advisory Council of the Nigerian Women’s Trust Fund, a member of the Advisory Board of the State Partnership for Agriculture (SPA) of the Synergies Institute, a member of the Advisory Board of the HID Awolowo Foundation and also serves on the Governing Council of Elizade University, Nigeria. She holds a Ph.D. (Honoris Causa) in Sociology from the Tai Solarin University of Education, Nigeria.
Bisi is the author of ‘Speaking for Myself’: Perspectives on Social, Political and Feminist Activism in Africa (2013), ‘Speaking above a Whisper’, (2013) an autobiography and ‘Loud Whispers’ (2017). She also co-edited ‘Voice, Power and Soul’, with Jessica Horn (2008) a compilation of images and stories of African Feminists. She is married to Dr. Kayode Fayemi, the Governor of Ekiti State.
