MOIYATTU BANYA

Moiyattu Banya is of Sierra Leonean heritage and splits her time between the diaspora and Sierra Leone. She is a Social Entrepreneur and non-profit development specialist with 10 years of experience in Gender & Youth development and Communications. Her educational background is in Public Health from Rutgers University. She holds a Masters in Social Enterprise Administration and Management with a focus in International Development from Columbia University School of Social work with a minor in Law. Moiyattu’s experience as Executive Director of Girls Empowerment Summit Sierra Leone (GESSL) and Creative Director and Founder of Women Change Africa (WCA) has allowed her to do exactly what she loves – create communities on and offline for African women and girls. Moiyattu has a passion for Africa and the diaspora and has been blessed to work in various cities across the world including: Freetown, Accra, New York, Entebbe, and Dakar. In 2012, she cofounded the feminist social impact not-for-profit organization, GESSL, which focuses on building the capacities of girls in Sierra Leone to become leaders and change agents in their communities. That same year, she launched WCA, which curates stories of African women owned brands, not-for-profit organizations and small businesses. WCA has now grown to a firm that provides strategy development, PR and coaching services. ​Her work was recently featured as a Okay100women honoree by Okay Africa Magazine, as well as on various online platforms, including Elle South Africa, Applause Africa, Radio France International. She has served as a Lecturer at Columbia University’s school of social work and as a feminist educator at Temple University’s Gender and Sexuality studies program. Moiyattu consulted for companies and organizations such as the MasterCard Foundation, The University of West Indies Cave Hill Barbados, and UN-Women. Currently, Moiyattu is an advisory board member of The African Women’s Development Fund-USA an is a published writer. She is a woman of faith, and takes pleasure in traveling and spending time with her family.