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MAZUBA HAANYAMA SPEAKS ON HOW PEOPLE OF AFRICAN-DESCENT ARE LEADING THE CHARGE FOR GLOBAL CHANGE

Beginning with the Youth Summit on May 21, 2012 and ending with the OpenForum Summit May 22-24, 2012, the African Foundation of the Open Society will welcome activists, businesspeople, academics, and policymakers from throughout the African continent and around the world will convene for an unprecedented conference about “Money, Power, Sex and the Paradox of Unequal Growth” in Cape Town, South Africa.  Ebony talks with Mazuba Haanyama a Program Associate for Special Projects with the Open Society Initiative for Southern Africa (OSISA) about this historic event and how Africa and people of African-descent are leading the charge for global change.

EBONY:  Could you tell us about OSISA and the four Open Society foundations?

MH:  The Open Society has many foundations around the world including the Open Society Institute in the United States, but there are four African foundations.  OSF SA (Open Society Foundation for South Africa) was the first African Open Society foundation and then OSISA (Open Society Initiative for Southern Africa), OSIEA (Open Society Initiative for East Africa), and OSIWA (Open Society Initiative for West Africa) soon followed.

We, OSISA, do not conduct operations in South Africa as there is already the South African foundation (OSF SA) instead we focus our efforts in 10 countries in southern Africa:  Angola, Botswana, DRC, Lesotho, Malawi, Mozambique, Namibia, Swaziland, Zambia and Zimbabwe.  In addition to coordinating the Open Forum 2012, we have several programs, such as HIV and AIDS, Language Rights, Education, Gender/Women’s Right, LGBTI Initiative and more that our websitewww.osisa.org details.

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