About Us
The Global Activists Network (GAN) is a women-led leadership network promoting the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). The aim is to unleash the power of connected minds through dialogue and collective action.
The leadership programme takes place in a world captivated by geopolitical tensions, an urgent climate crisis, increasing poverty and inequities as well as recovery from the COVID-19 pandemic. Against this backdrop, this initiative would be an opportunity for changemakers to hold a dialogue and place their demands from global leaders.
GAN is the repository of global changemakers who have dedicated their lives to create social impact in their communities through adversity.
Our Core Committee
Lemona Chanda
Founder & CEO
Lemona is an award-winning gender equity and sustainable development practitioner. She is the Founder of Our Cause, a not-for-profit organisation working to achieve Agenda 2030. She works on policy development and awareness-building with marginalised communities in low and middle-income countries including Bangladesh, India, and Pan-Africa, the United Kingdom and Canada.
She has been named as the UN Champion for Change for her contribution in raising awareness of gender equality. She is an Advisor to the Commonwealth Business Women’s Network advising on women’s legal barrier’s trade, an Executive Committee Member for United Nation’s Women Advisory Council and is an Executive Committee Member of WILPFUK since 2020. She has led over 1000 activists and NGOs globally on Sustainable Development Goals to collectively address issues such as gender discrimination. For her work in diversity and inclusion, she has been recognised as the Ethnic Minority Future Leader in the UK. She has also been selected as the Pulse Featured Changemaker for using technology to create accessibility to education in the Global South. In 2022, she was named a McCain Global Leader.
Lemona works with marginalised communities to promote the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). She provides training to empower the youth globally on pertinent areas such as leadership, creating social impact, commercial awareness, financial literacy, raising awareness of STEAM, health and reproductive rights and land rights. She has delivered her sessions to over a thousand marginalised youths including a school in the hills in Chittagong Hill Tracts (CHT) Bangladesh to indigenous students, Anglia Ruskin University and also University of Sussex. She works with the minority communities in Bangladesh including the LGBTQ community, sex workers as well as religious and ethnic minorities through her campaign “She Owns” to reform land and property laws and “Literacy as Inclusion” to promote financial-digital literacy. She sits at the Global Advisory Committee of Equal Asia Foundation and is the Law & Advocacy Director of Women in Global Health, Bangladesh.
Gertrude Asumadu
Co-Founder & Executive Director
Gertrude Asumadu is an award winning activist and campaigner. She is a graduate in Msc Public Administration (specialising in International and European Governance) from Leiden University and a BSc (Hons) Economics from University of Leeds with experience in international affairs specifically in policy, advocacy and campaigns related to education, poverty, HIV/AIDS, climate change, gender equality among others. Gertrude has worked with multiple charities and organisations within international affairs including the ONE Campaign, Christian Aid, Child.Org, UNICEF, Restless Development, Amnesty International, UNDP Asia to mention a few. She has gained experience in the international development field which has empowered her as a young leader/changemaker to continually make an impact in society.
Currently, she is a Their World Global Youth Ambassador and a ONE UK community leader where she campaigns on global issues such as health, food crisis, climate change, refugee crisis among others. She was recently a UN Women UK delegate to the CSW 67, a Local Pathways Fellow with the UN Sustainable Development Solutions Network (SDSN) Youth, Review Panellist for United Nations Systems Staff College (UNSSC), One Young World Ambassador, AFS Youth Assembly UK Ambassador, World Bank Youth Summit Delegate, African Changemakers Initiative Fellow among others.
In March 2023, she was invited to speak at the SDG Student Programme’s Global Issue Forum, March 2023 edition on ‘Extreme Poverty’. She was also invited to speak at Results UK National Conference in July 2023 where she spoke about the ‘Power in Youth Voices’ among other esteemed speakers. She was also invited by the Gates Foundation in September 2023 to attend the annual GoalKeepers event in New York celebrating young changemakers across the globe.
She has won awards including, C Hub Magazine CA Awards Young Achiever of the Year (2016), Women4Africa Young Achiever of the Year, (2017), Suffragette Spirit Campaign Honour, Amnesty International (2018), Royal Society of Arts Fellowship (2018), Best in MP Advocacy Award, The ONE Campaign (2022) among others.
Phoebe Wyvill
Content and Media Strategist
Phoebe Wyvill is a recent graduate of MA Global Governance and Diplomacy at the University of Leeds, where she specialised in translation diplomacy. She also obtained a BA International History and Politics at Leeds in 2022. During her studies, Phoebe maintained an acute focus on marginalised groups, and specialised in studying policy development, refugee repatriation, and cross-cultural translation in the Arab world.
Phoebe was a delegate at the Young Diplomats’ Forum in 2022, where she gained experience in policymaking and addressing underrepresentation of marginalised groups in political spaces. Also, Phoebe is currently a UN Women UK delegate to the CSW 68, where she will contribute to conversations surrounding women empowerment and investing in women globally. She is passionate about women’s rights, refugee rights, and post-conflict humanitarian reconstruction.
Sunday Timothy Taiwo
Social Media Manager
Sunday Taiwo is a media and development professional with over five years’ experience in
leveraging digital technology to advance social sector development, particularly in the areas of youth mobilization for community development, governance and policy reform advocacy, and education for sustainable development. With proven track record, he has driven impactful results by steering effective communication strategies, spearheading project activations and managing partnerships with critical stakeholders for non-profit civic-tech organizations in Africa, including LeapSpring Network, Paradigm Leadership Support Initiative (PLSI), and FactCheckAfrica.
As a serial volunteer, he has engaged extensively with a number of local, national and global
organizations, including LightHub Initiative (which he co-founded), TEDxAllianceWay, The
Smart Project, Super Parents Foundation, Peace First, Social Development and Advocacy Project (SDAP), and World’s Largest Lesson, where his substantial contributions have played a pivotal role in driving impactful humanitarian projects which have impacted over 4 million people across different regions of Nigeria. In 2019, he served as a community educator for the World’s Largest Lesson “Introducing the Global Goals in Africa” program through which he, alongside 36 fellow SDGs advocates, introduced the Global Goals to over 12000 students across secondary schools in South-West Nigeria.
Sunday is a member of the UN Sustainable Development Solutions Network (SDSN) Nigeria, and a 2023 Fellow of The Platform Young Professionals Bootcamp (YPB).
At the University of Ibadan, his alma mata, he served as president for the National Association of Oyo Students and as Chairman, Educational Management Students Association Electoral Committee, between 2017 and 2019. He holds a bachelor’s degree in Educational Management/English Language.
Nimra Noor
Global Changemakers Lead
Nimra is a passionate youth activist and change promoter from Pakistan, with a background in Economics and Finance. She is dedicated to integrating sustainability into economic policies and has worked on ESG factors at the National Disaster and Risk Management Fund. Nimra has compiled a report on Pakistan’s Climate Index and has been actively involved in promoting environmental awareness as a Youth Green Ambassador for Sustainability at SOS International in the Netherlands.
She is also an active social worker with affiliations with SOS Children’s Village International. Nimra currently serves as the president of the youth-led sustainability society, Mentor Amiable Professional Society, and has contributed globally to social change, peacebuilding, and sustainability. She has organized multiple events, workshops and seminars, focusing on peace and sustainability. Excited to join Global Activists Network as a Global Changemakers Lead Role, she believes in the power of collaboration and community to drive positive change and invites others to join her in her journey to make a meaningful impact and shape a brighter future for all.