Dr Mjiba Fehiwot is a Pan-Africanist, Senior Research Fellow, who promotes African-Centered knowledge production, and is the second featured nominee of the Women at the Helm campaign

Africa is a living concept, so says Dr. Mjiba Fehiwot who has long challenged the constructs of thought that have allowed Africans and especially African women to be disconnected from their culture and values. Mijiba has been nominated and recognised by Southern Hemisphere as a Women at the Helm of an important continental and global movement for change in Africa.

Dr. Frehiwot thinks deeply about how to decolonize and re-Africanise knowledge production in Africa and is a leading thinker and connector of continental movements to shift the narrative around Africa. Her life’s work has been to inform, educate and provide guidance to scholars and practitioners of Pan-African thinking and practice on the continent and across the world.

Core to her conviction is the belief there is still work to be done and that much remains unfinished with respect to the liberation and transformation of Africa. Although the construct of decolonisation of learning is a phrase often heard, the realities of decolonisation involve hard work and a deep challenging of all that is taken as a given. And if there is someone who is at the forefront of doing the academic and social work of deconstruction, it is Mijiba who has a Ph.D. in African Studies from Howard University in Washington DC and whose 2011 Dissertation “Education and Pan-Africanism: A Case Study of Ghana, 1957-1966” has been globally acknowledged. She is a Senior Research Fellow in the Institute of African Studies, University of Ghana, and was a Visiting Assistant Professor in the Pan-Africana Studies Department at Lincoln University from 2022-2023 Her commitment to transforming Africa is evident in her co-edited volume titled, The  Unfinished Business of Liberation and Transformation published by Darajaa Press that she edited with Dzodzi Tsikata and Edem Adotey.

A leading thinker and academic across the African continent and across the globe, she chooses not to remain theoretical and shares practically through her vast networks and through life coaching. When asked, what has inspired you to become the thought leader you are, and what challenges you had to overcome to achieve your success, she responded,

“I am not sure I am a thought leader. I am simply fulfilling my responsibility as an African but also as a woman and as someone who has had many people pour into them. For me this work is more than a career or even a job. It is a calling, I, like many Pan-Africanists before me have been called to play our rightful part in the larger global Pan-African Movement. Regarding challenges, I have daily challenges and I struggle to overcome them as we speak. The only advice I can give to women who are facing challenges is to walk through them, know that change is constant and make decisions based on your principles and values.”

Her recently produced video Umoja: Africa Must Unite Now is a study that inspires a conversation about the importance of the unification of Africa around values, values that transcend political systems and are centred around amongst other things, Ubuntu. In order to attain the vision for Africa, education systems that are the product of Africa’s colonial past need to be transformed to address the issues facing modern Africans and those in the African diaspora. Dr. Frehiwot is also very proud to be the Treasurer of the African Studies Association of Africa and an Associate Editor of Feminist Africa. Both projects align with her vision of Pan-Africanism.


Mjiba was nominated by Mark Abrahams of Southern Hemisphere for the Women at the Helm awards, a campaign conceived to honour women leaders in our network who are at the forefront of leading in the different spheres of social justice. Southern Hemisphere is a female-founded and managed business specialising in social justice.

Mark says of Mjiba; “Mjiba stands out head and shoulders amongst others in her field, she is a leader and has provided leadership in every aspect of her career, be it as a life-coach, an academic or as an associate editor. She is not only an example of what is possible but she stands as a beacon of hope for every person, young and old to emulate and support.”


Dr Mjiba Frehiwot is the newly appointed Editor-in-Chief of the African Evaluation Journal and is leading the discourse on evaluation in Africa. She is forging a path that encourages us to nurture value systems that embrace not only our Africanness but above all our humanity and is the epitome of a Women at the Helm.

A Southern Hemisphere blog post celebrating Women at the Helm. For more stories about women making waves, follow Southern Hemisphere on LinkedIn.