Category: Former President

Dzodzi Tsikata is a Research Professor of Development Sociology and Director of the Institute of African Studies (IAS) at the University of Ghana since August 2016. Before this, she was based at the Institute of Statistical, Social and Economic Research (ISSER) during which time she was Deputy Director and Director of the Centre for Gender Studies and Advocacy (CEGENSA) at the University of Ghana. She holds a Ph.D in Social Sciences from Leiden University in the Netherlands. In a career spanning over 25 years, Tsikata’s research has been in the areas of gender and development policies and practices; women’s movements and gender equality activism; the politics and livelihood effects of land tenure reforms, large scale land acquisitions and agricultural commercialisation; and informal labour relations and conditions of work, and she is widely published on these subjects. Her most recent publications include a co-guest edited (with Cheryl Doss and Gale Summerfield) special issue of Feminist Economics on Land, Gender and Food Security (2014), an edited book (with Cheryl Rodriguez and Akosua Adomako Ampofo), Transatlantic Feminisms: Women and Gender Studies in Africa and the Diaspora published by Lexington Books (2015) and an edited book (with Ruth Hall and Ian Scoones), “Africa’s Land Rush: Implications for Rural Livelihoods and Agrarian Change”, published by Boydell and Brewer Ltd (2015). Dzodzi teaches an advanced gender and women’s study course in the Ph.D. Development Studies Programme at ISSER. Dzodzi is on the editorial advisory board of Journal of Peasant Studies and the Canadian Journal of Development Studies and is a member of the editorial collective of Agrarian South: Journal of Political Economy and an Associate editor of Feminist Economics. She is a member of the UN Committee for Development Policy and until recently was a Commissioner of Ghana’s National Development Planning Commission. Dzodzi Tsikata also serves on the Boards of the International Association for Feminist Economics (IAFFE), Third World Network Africa, the Network for women’s Rights in Ghana (NETRIGHT), the Sam Moyo African Institute for Agrarian Studies (SMAIAS) and the Centre for Democratic Development (CDD).

Fatima Harrak is a Historian and political scientist, a graduate of the Institut d’Etudes Politiques in Paris and the University of London School of Oriental and African Studies. She is a research scholar at the University of Mohamed V Institute of African Studies and served as its Director from 2003 to 2008. She has been a visiting scholar at a number of African, European and U.S. universities. She was the coordinator of a research structure at IAS dealing with “Religious Dynamics in Africa”. And is the author of several books and numerous studies, articles and book reviews which have appeared in Moroccan and foreign scientific journals. Her research in progress covers the themes of “Slavery in Moroccan-African Relations », in collaboration with Northwestern University’s Institute for the Study of Islamic Thought in Africa (ISITA) and ? «Women and the Transmission of learning in the Islamic West from 16th to 19th centuries” within the framework of IAS research group “Religious Dynamics in Africa”.

Vice President of CODESRIA from 2008 to 2011, Fatima Harrak was the President of CODESRIA from December 2011 to June 2015.

• Memory, Music and Religion: Morocco’s Mystical Chanters, Reviewed by Fatima Harrak Journal of the American Academy of Religion , 2008; doi: 10.1093/jaarel/lfn022
• “Young Modernists versus Old Turbans – Reform and Resistance in Pre-colonial Morocco”, Travaux du Colloque de Tachkent (Sephis, 2007)
• « Ahmad Baba al-Tinbucti and Salih al-Fullani – Linking the Moroccan and Indian Scholary Traditions », Majallat Afaq, Université Mohammed V-Souissi, Rabat, 2005
• «Shari’a and Tariqa in Fayd al-Mannan – A Modern Formulation of an Old Debate», The Maghreb Review, , Vol. 29, Nos.1-4, 2004
• « Tamaththul Maghrib al-qarn al-tasi’ ‘ashar ‘inda ba’di al-rahhala al-afariqa” (Representation of 19th century Morocco by African pilgrims ), al-Manahil Nos.71-72, 2004
• « Hashiya ‘ala Kitab al-Zawiya al-Fasiyya li Noufissa Dahbi », Majallat Al Jam’iyya al Maghribiyya li al Bahth al-Tarikhi , No.1, 2003
• « Le soufisme face a la mondialisation: cas des confréries d’origine africaine aux USA », in Confréries soufies d’Afrique : Nouveaux rôles, nouveaux enjeux, Edited by the Institute of African Studies, Rabat, 2004, pp.177-201.
• «Esclavage dans les relations maroco-africaines », en collaboration.
• «Femmes et transmission du savoir en Afrique et dans l’Occident Musulman entre le 16eme et 19ème siecles », project commencé avec Beverly Mack, de l’université du Kansas et poursuivi en collaboration avec des chercheurs marocains
• Dynamique religieuse en Afrique

The late Professor Sam Moyo (1954-2015) was a well respected Zimbabwean scholar who published extensively on land, agrarian and environmental issues. He was the founder and executive director of the Harare based African Institute for Agrarian Studies (AIAS), an independent policy research institution committed to the development of agrarian systems that enhance equitable land rights and sustainable land uses throughout Africa. In 2016, the organization was renamed the Sam Moyo African Institute for Agrarian Studies in his honour.

Sam Moyo had extensive years of research and teaching experience on rural development issues with a focus on land reform, agrarian change, environmental policy, and social movements. He lectured in various universities including Calabar and Port Harcourt in Nigeria, the University of Zimbabwe, the University of Fort Hare in South Africa, and in various international training programmes.

His extensive portfolio also included leading and managing a wide range of policy research, university and civil society organizations in Africa. He was a founding research fellow of the Zimbabwe Institute of Development Studies which was in 1990 incorporated into the University of Zimbabwe as the Institute of Development Studies. He was a founder member of Harare based ZERO (a SADC region Environment Organization) and was its Executive Secretary from 1986 to 1999 and Chairman from 2000 to 2011. He  worked as an Associate Professor at the Institute of Development Studies at the University of Zimbabwe and as a Director for the Southern African Regional Institute for Policy Studies (SARIPS) based in Harare, Zimbabwe. He also worked as a senior advisor on land policy matters concerning various governments in the southern Africa region and acted as senior advisor and chair of numerous land networks such as the Southern African Network on Land (SANL), Land Rights Network of Southern Africa (LRNSA), and Knowledge Management Africa–Development Bank of Southern Africa (KMA-DBSA). Sam Moyo served in various boards including: HAKIARDHI (Tanzania), International Development Economics Associates (IDEAs) in India, ZERO (Zimbabwe). He was also a reviewer and editorial board member for the following: Review of African Political Economy (ROAPE), Journal of Peacebuilding and Development and the African Journal of International Affairs. It was under Moyo’s stewardship that the Agrarian South Network, a tri-continental network of researchers interested in land and agrarian questions from Africa, Asia and Latin America/Carribean, was born.

A robust thinker and leading academic, Sam Moyo was involved in several major publications. Some of his key celebrated academic works are:

(1) Books which include: The Land Question in Zimbabwe (Harare: Sapes Books, 1995); Land Reform Under Structural Adjustment in Zimbabwe (Uppsala: The Nordic Africa Institute, 2000); African Land Questions, Agrarian Transitions and the State: Contradictions of Neoliberal Land Reforms, (CODESRIA Greenbook, Dakar: 2008);

(2) Articles: The Politics of Land Distribution and Race Relations in Southern Africa (New York: UNRISD, Sept. 2001); (co-authored with Paris Yeros): The radicalized state: Zimbabwe’s interrupted revolution. Review of African Political Economy (ROAPE) No. 111: 103-121. 2007; (Co-authored with Paris Yeros): The Zimbabwe Question and the Two Lefts. Historical Materialism 15 (2007) 1771-204. BRILL. (2007);

(3) Co-edited various book publications which include (recently published): [co-edited with Paris Yeros]: Reclaiming the Land: The Resurgence of Rural Movements in Africa, Asia and Latin America (London: Zed Books, 2005); [co-edited with Kojo Sebastian Amanor]: Land and Sustainable Development in Africa (London: Zed Books, April 2008).

He served as the Vice President of CODESRIA from 1995-1998 and subsequently as its President from 2008-2011.

Professor Moyo passed away in November, 2015 following injuries sustained in a car accident in New Delhi, India.

Teresa Cruz e Silva, Mozambican, holds a PhD in Social Sciences from the University of Bradford (United Kingdom). Currently an Associate Professor at the Centre for African Studies (CEA) and the Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences at the Eduardo Mondlane University, Maputo, Mozambique, she has in the past been Director of the CEA and Dean of the Faculty of Humanities. She is also a researcher at the Centre for Social Studies, Aquino de Bragança (CESAB) where she has also been a Director. Tereza Cruz e Silva is also active in the Women and Law in Southern Africa (WLSA), an NGO that conducts research on the legal situation of women in seven southern African countries (Botswana, Lesotho, Malawi, Mozambique, Swaziland, Zambia and Zimbabwe). She was an Executive Committee member of CODESRIA between 2002 and 2008, and its President from 2005 to 2008.

Teresa Cruz e Silva is a member of various of research and scientific networks. She is also on the editorial board of several local and international journals. She is a visiting professor to various foreign institutions such as the Centre of African Studies (CEA) of the University of Porto (Portugal), the Centre for Social Studies at the University of Coimbra (Portugal), the Institute of Philosophy and Humanities at the University of Campinas (Brazil) and the Group on African Studies, Culture and Historiography (LABTEO-History) of the University of Sao Paulo (Brazil). In 2011, she was appointed, as a foreign member of the Humanities Department of the Academy of Sciences of Lisbon (Portugal).

Her main research interests include contemporary social history of Mozambique and Southern Africa, the African Liberation Movements and Nationalism, Social Networks, Religion and Society, Social Identities and Youth, Studies on Regional Security and Gender. Among the various articles, book chapters and books she has published are the following titles:

• Sousa Santos, Boaventura. & Cruz e Silva, Teresa. (2004) (orgs) Reinvenção EA da Moçambique Emancipação social. Maputo: Centro de Formação Jurídica e Judiciary;
• Cruz e Silva, Teresa Araújo, & Manuel Cardoso, Carlos (orgs) (2005) ’Em Lusofonia Africa: Historia, Democracia e Integração africana. “Dakar: CODESRIA;
• Cruz e Silva, Teresa (2006) “Solidarity Networks as entities to resolve conflicts.” In: Santos Trindade and Meneses, Law and Justice in a Multicultural Society: The Case of Mozambique. Dakar: CODESRIA;
• Cruz e Silva, Teresa, and food. (2007) Representações e Pratica sober Between Sexualidad Jovens Feminização EA does SIDA em Moçambique: Estudos de Caso e Centro Sul do not País. Maputo: WLSA Moçambique;
• Osorio, Conceição. & Cruz e Silva, Teresa. (2008) Buscando Sentidos: Género e Sexualidad Between estudante Jovens do ensino secundário, Moçambique. Maputo: WLSA Moçambique;
• Cruz e Silva, Teresa. (2008) “Evangelicals and Democracy in Mozambique”. In: Ranger, To Evangelical Christianity and Democracy in Africa. Oxford: Oxford University Press,
• Osorio, Conceição. & Cruz e Silva, Teresa. . (2009) Genero e Governação Local: Estudo of caso did Província Manica, distritos of Tmbara e Machaze. Maputo: WLSA Moçambique;
• Cruz e Silva, Teresa (2010). Public and Private and the Social Role of Universities in Africa. Dakar: CODESRIA

Zenebeworke Tadesse is an Ethiopian development specialist with degrees in Sociology and International Relations from Binghamton University, USA. Her area of specialization covers gender relations, governance, rural development and research on poverty. She is a founding member and first Executive Secretary of the Association of African Women for Research and Development (AAWORD). She is also a member of the executive board of both the African Gender Institute, based in the University of Cape Town, South Africa, and the Africa Governance Institute, based in Dakar, Senegal. Tadesse was the Deputy Executive Secretary of CODESRIA and head of its Publications Programme (1987–1993) and the first woman President of CODESRIA’s Executive Committee (2002–2005).

She has worked extensively on gender issues and social politics in Africa with various organisations in the UN system, as well as with other development groups and NGOs. Zenebeworke Tadesse was Director of Global Fund for Women, Director of Learning Partenrship for Women, and also a member of the Executive Committee of United Nation’s Research Institute for Social Development (UNRISD). She presently serves as a member and editor of the Management Committee of the Forum for Social Studies, based in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia.

Among her publications are The Condition of Women in Ethiopia (SIDA, Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, 1975); Kevina Ethiopia (Scandinavian Institute of African Studies, Uppsala, 1977); Children in Zambia (with Catherine Mwanamamba, SIDA, Stockholm, 1979); Women and Rural Development in Africa: An Overview (ILO/WFP Working Paper Series, Geneva, Switzerland, 1984); Women’s Land Right in Ethiopia (1998); Issues in Rural Development (Proceedings of the Inaugural Workshop of the Forum for Social Studies, 2000), Gender and Economic Policy (Forum for Social Studies, 2003) and Revisiting Customary Institutions and Gender Relations: A Daunting Challenge (FAO Gender and Land Compendium of Country Studies, 2005).

Zenebeworke Tadesse is a member of the Ethiopian Academy of Sciences.

Dr Akilagpa Sawyerr is a Ghanaian academic and jurist. He was educated at the Universities of Durham, London and Berkeley in California, obtaining the degrees of LLB, LLM and J.S.D. He is a Barrister of Law and a Solicitor of the Supreme Courts of Ghana and of Papua New Guinea.

Prof. Sawyerr has been teaching Law since 1964 lecturing all over the African continent and beyond. From 2003 to 2008 he was Secretary General of the Association of African Universities (AAU). Prior to his involvement with this organization, Dr Sawyerr has held many positions at the University of Dar-es-Salaam (1964 to 1970), University of Ghana (1970 to 1998), the University of Papua New Guinea (1979 to 1984). From 1985-1992 Professor Sawyerr was Vice-Chancellor of the University of Ghana. Professor Sawyerr has worked with a number of African universities in other capacities as well and was also the President of CODESRIA from 1996 to 1998.

Professor Sawyerr has published a number of books, chapters and journal articles, which encompass a wide range of topics and interests, with emphasis on legal matters in African countries and issues relating to higher education on the continent.

Ernest Wamba dia Wamba was born in Sundi-Lutete, Kongo Central Province. As a child he attended a Swedish mission school and his growing into adulthood was during the period when the prophetism of Simon Kimbangu and the political struggle for independence by the Association of the Bakongo People (ABAKO) was reaching its peak. When ABAKO split, he favored the party of Daniel Kanza.
On his graduating from secondary school, he was one of three students awarded scholarships by the African-American Institute to study in the United States. He attended Western Michigan University in Kalamazoo where he wrote his dissertation on the philosophers “Maurice Merleau-Ponty and Jean-Paul Sartre”. Wamba then attended Claremont university before teaching at The University of Brandeis where he was associated with Peter F. Drucker. He later on went on to teach at the Harvard University in Cambridge, MA.

During his period in the U.S., Wamba dia Wamba married an African-American woman and was involved in the Civil Rights Movement through the Nonviolent Coordinating Student Committee. Once the period of decolonization began in Africa, he joined the supporting committees of various US-based pan-Africanist liberation movements.

In 1980, he accepted a position as Professor of History at the University of Dar es Salaam in Tanzania. Whilst visiting his parents’ village in 1981, he was arrested by the government of Mobutu Sese-Seko for possessing a paper he had written that was deemed ’subversive’, and was detained for a period of one year. He continued his role as a prominent figure in both academia and political circles in Africa. He was President of the Council for the Development of Social Science Research in Africa (CODESRIA) between 1992 and 1995 as well as the founder and President of the Philosophy Club at the University of Dar es Salaam. He is an expert in the Palaver and other indigenous forms of African democracy. He participated in the Sovereign National Conference, held from 1990 through to 1992 in Zaire. In 1997 he co-authored with Jacques Depelchin on “The African Declaration against Genocide’ . Most recently in 2009, he wrote a book entitled “Política Africana Contemporânea: O Caso da República Democrática do Congo”.

Taladidia Thiombiano, from Burkina Faso, is an economist with a Masters Degree in Development Economy from Paris II/Pantheon University and a post-Masters degree in Econometry from Paris IX/Dauphine. He also holds a Certificate of Environment Economy from the World Bank’s Development Economy Institute (IDE). He has worked with several research and higher education institutions, including the International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI) in Washington, Michigan State University, and University of Groningen, Laval University of Quebec, Canada, Bordeaux IV University, France.

Taladidia Thiombiano was Director of the Centre for Studies, Documentation and Economic and Social Research (CEDRES) from 1977 to 1990, and then from 2004 onwards. He also taught Economics at the Ouagadougou University and later became the Dean of its Economic Science Department (FASEG) between 1982 and 1987. He has also taught in many other African universities.

Thiombiano was CODESRIA‘s President from 1989 to 1992, after which he assumed other academic and administrative responsibilities, namely as Director of the African Network for Environment Economics (RAEE) between 1995 and 2000, Member of the general delegate of the African College of Socio-econometry since 1997, Director of Ouagadougou University’s Centre for the Protection, Management and Promotion of the Environment (CEPAPE) between 1999 and 2001, Coordinator of Cooperation between Ouagadougou University and the Netherlands from 1999 to 2000, Member of the Scientific Committee on Environmental Issues for the Monetary and Economic Union of West Africa (UEMOA) since 2004, and permanent member of the Experts Commission of the African Union (AU) on higher education in Africa, since 2006.

His major publications include:

•  Crise financière économique internationale: analyse théorique et empirique et implications pour le continent africain, L’Harmattan,2010.
• Econométrie des séries temporelles: cours et exercices, L’Harmattan, 2008.

Claude Eleme Ake, from Nigeria, held a PhD from Columbia University in 1966. After his studies, Ake worked as assistant professor at Columbia University. In 1967, he published his first book, A Theory of Political Integration, and in 1969, he took up a position as professor of political science at Carleton University in Ottawa, Canada. From 1972 to 1974, Ake was a visiting professor at the University of Dar es Salaam in Tanzania. In the mid-1970s, Ake returned to Nigeria to take up an appointment at the newly-founded University of Port Harcourt in his native Rivers State. He served as Professor of Political Economy and later, as Dean of the Faculty of Social Sciences.

In 1986, Claude Ake was elected President of the Council for the Development of Social Science Research in Africa (CODESRIA) of which he was a founding member. In 1989, he took time off from the University of Port Harcourt to help form one of the country’s new political parties. The parties were later abolished by the military government, and all academics that went into politics were not allowed to return to their teaching jobs. But he later took up a position at the Brookings Institution in Washington, D.C.

Ake soon returned to Nigeria and, in 1991, he founded the Center for Advanced Social Science (CASS), a think-tank intended to foster development from within. On 7 November 1996, he was flying back to the United States after attending a CASS workshop on conflict resolution in Africa when the plane crashed, killing all on board.

Ake’s final projects were focused on the roots of violence in Africa, political violence in Nigeria, and concepts of ethnicity. His last books, Democracy and Development in Africa and The Feasibility of Democracy in Africa were published posthumously by CODESRIA in 1997 and 2000. Several scholarships and awards have since been established in Ake’s name, including the Claude Ake Memorial Awards Program, funded by the Ford Foundation, and the Claude Ake Award for Excellence in Political Science.