Nanjira Sambuli

NanjiraSambuli is a researcher, policy analyst, and advocacy strategist interested in and working on understanding the unfolding impacts of ICT adoption and how those impact governance, media, entrepreneurship, and culture, with a keen focus on gender implications.

Sambuli is a commissioner on the Lancet & Financial Times Global Commission on Governing Health Futures 2030; a board member at The New Humanitarian , Development Gateway, and Digital Impact Alliance (DIAL); and co-chair of the Transform Health Coalition. She is also a Ford Global Fellow. Sambuli also advises the World Economic Forum on its Preparing Civil Society for the Fourth Industrial Revolution and Technology and Social Justice initiatives and the  <A+> Alliance for Inclusive Algorithms. She is on the advisory board for Latitude: Rethinking Power Relations – for a decolonised and non-racial world at the Goethe Institut.

Sambuli led policy advocacy to promote digital equality in access to and use of the Internet at the World Wide Web Foundation  and managed the foundation’s Women’s Rights Online work.  She previously worked at the iHub in Nairobi, where she provided strategic guidance for growth of technology innovation research in the East Africa region. She served as a panel member on the United Nations Secretary General’s High-Level Panel on Digital Cooperation, a member of  DFID’s Digital Advisory Panel, a trustee at UK Citizens Online Democracy (mySociety), and a deputy on the United Nations Secretary General’s High-Level Panel for Women’s Economic Empowerment .

In recognition of her work, Sambuli was named one of New African Magazine's 100 Most Influential Africans in 2016, and BBC’s 100 Inspiring and Influential Women in 2019.