The Media Foundation for West Africa (MFWA) has appointed three new senior staff members to complement the organisation’s programme team, ongoing sustainability initiatives and co-ordination of a continental network of freedom of expression organisations, which is hosted by the MFWA.

Mr. Venancious Ngmenkom Tuor has been appointed as Co-ordinator of the Africa Freedom of Expression Exchange (AFEX). AFEX is the network of the nine major freedom of expression and media development organisations in Africa with the MFWA as the Secretariat.

Prior to joining the MFWA as the AFEX Network Co-ordinator, Mr. Tuor worked with many regional and international organisations, including the USAID West Africa Agribusiness and Trade Promotion Project; IFDC’s Dutch-funded 2SCALE Project; the USAID West Africa Fertilizer Project.  He had also previously worked for the United Nations, and Borderless Alliance West Africa.   

The MFWA has also appointed Ms. Anjali Manivannan as Programme Officer for its Freedom of Expression and International Criminal Justice Advocacy programme. Ms. Manivannan holds a Juris Doctor (J.D.) degree from New York University School of Law, which provided a grant through its prestigious Arthur Helton Global Human Rights Fellowship for her to work with the MFWA.

Ms. Manivannan has previously researched for Human Rights Watch; People’s Watch, an NGO in Tamil Nadu, India; Badil Resource Center for Palestinian Residency and Refugee Rights, an NGO in Bethlehem in the West Bank; and for former U.N. Special Rapporteur on Violence against Women, Radhika Coomaraswamy. She also has several years of advocacy experience in human rights in Sri Lanka. Ms. Manivannan has been published in New York University’s Journal of International Law and Politics

As part of its sustainability initiatives, the MFWA has also appointment Mr. Byron Taylor as Managing Consultant of the Organization's newly-established Consultancy Unit. Before his appointment, Mr. Taylor was the Chief Executive Officer of CSR Foundation in Ghana and had also previously served as Executive Secretary for the Institute of Public Relations in Ghana. In the United States, he worked as a marketing executive for Huntington Bank and was also a columnist for African Weekender magazine and The Star newspaper in Columbus, Ohio.

“We are extremely excited to have three new highly qualified colleagues joining the MFWA team to collectively work with our partners to help improve freedom of expression and democratisation in West Africa,” said Sulemana Braimah, Executive Director of the MFWA.         

According to the Executive Director, the appointments form part of the MFWA’s ongoing efforts to build on the strong foundations laid by the organisation’s founder and immediate past Executive Director, Prof. Kwame Karikari.