Passionate about youth, Vivian Onano advocates for girls’ access to education as well as women economic empowerment, and leadership. The youth activist and entrepreneur is also the founder of ‘Leading Light Initiatives’.

Leading Light Initiatives is an organization established in 2019. This organization works with deprived communities in South Africa. It offers youth, women and disabled people opportunities that are geared towards ending poverty.

According to Vivian, her commitment to this course was born out of a personal experience. As a child, she grew up in a rural area where she witnessed several early marriages of some family members and neighbours. These are girls who had been denied education and forced into parenthood. On getting a scholarship to attend high school, Vivian escaped that fate. This she said has been her motivation to offer African girls the same opportunity to access education and guarantee their future.

In addition, Vivian also advocated with WaterAid, a non-government organization (NGO) that promotes people’s access to clean water and sanitation. Here, Vivian looked at the correlations between girls’ access to education and the access to clean water and sanitation The NGO also launched a national platform to sensitize on the importance of menstrual hygiene.

Vivian was appointed Youth advisor to the United Nation’s (UN) Women global civil society advisory group, from 2014 to 2016. She also held several positions in different organizations, namely the African Leadership Academy as the external relations fellow and Africa 2.0 as the community and partnerships manager.

Furthermore, Vivian led several other initiatives, such as ‘Poverty is sexist ’campaign by ONE Campaign, to promote girls’ education in Africa. In 2018, she worked as Youth advisor to Global education monitoring for the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO).

Vivian Onano frequently speaks on topics related to education, women economic empowerment, Youth and leadership. In 2014, Forbes Woman Africa tagged her as ‘One to Watch’. Again in 2015, she received from Forbes Woman Africa Michelle Obama’s ‘Let girls Lean’ Award for her commitment to girls’ education. In 2017, Vivian was again awarded the New African Woman on the Rise.

REFERENCE

Information from www.africawomenexperts.com was used in this report