Hafsat Abiola - Women's Month Motivational Story #10

Hafsat Abiola is a young activist who works to promote women, youth, and democracy in Nigeria, and around the world. She is a founding member of several initiatives including Global Youth Connect, Youth Employment Campaign, and Vital Voices: Women in Democracy. She is a member of the World Wisdom Council and the World Future Council. Hafsat is the author of many articles published in international and national media, and assistant editor of Imagining Ourselves, an international anthology of women.

Hafsat is also the Executive Director of the Kudirat Initiative for Democracy, KIND, an NGO that seeks to empower democracy and development in Nigeria by strengthening organizations and creating initiatives that advance women. KIND’s main programme is Kudra, a programme that offers leadership training to 750 young women across Nigeria each year.


In recognition of her work, Hafsat was selected as a Global Leader of Tomorrow by the World Economic Forum in 2001 and as an Ashoka Fellow in 2003, and received awards from the State of the World Forum, the Association for Women’s Rights in Development, the Nuclear Age Peace Foundation, and the National Association of Nigerian Students. She sits on several boards including Educate Girls Globally, Women’s Learning Partnership, Youth Employment Campaign, and Institute of Noetic Sciences. Hafsat graduated from Harvard College in 1996 and received an honorary doctorate degree from Haverford College in 2003. - KIND

In 2006 Hafsat Abiola was nominated to be a founding councilor at the World Future Council. The same year, she raised funds by organizing performances of The Vagina Monologues in Nigeria. In 2008, the Europe-based A Different View chose Abiola to be one of the 15 Champions of World Democracy.

Recently, "The Supreme Price" a documentary was made about Hafsat's life by Joanna Lipper. “The Supreme Price” was a 2012 Gucci Tribeca Documentary Fund recipient and winner of the Spotlighting Women Documentary Award. It was also selected as one of the 10 short films for the Beyonce and Salma Hayek Chime for Change project.

You can find out more about Hafsat here and here.