Advisory Board
Omari Issa
Omari Issa is the CEO of Investment Climate Facility (ICF) for Africa. He is a Tanzanian citizen who is responsible for managing the ICF’s seven year program to improve Africa’s investment climate and remove barriers to growth.
Mr. Issa has extensive business experience in the public and private sectors, having worked in both Africa and abroad. He has firsthand experience of the realities of doing business in Africa, having previously worked as Executive Director and Chief Operating Officer of Celtel International, where he played an instrumental role in managing the company’s growth and expansion across the continent. Prior to working at Celtel, Mr. Issa spent fourteen years with the IFC and six years with the World Bank.
Julie Makani, MD
Dr. Julie Makani is a lecturer at Muhimbili University of Health and Allied Sciences (MUHAS), which is the main clinical, academic and research centre in Tanzania.
Her two related areas of specialty are malaria and Sickle Cell Disease (SCD), a blood disorder. SCD confers protection against the malaria infection. Hematology (the study of blood) and blood transfusion are her major areas of study. With support from the KEMRI-Wellcome program she received a Training fellowship from the Wellcome Trust to establish a systematic framework for comprehensive research and care, with one of the largest cohorts of SCD patients in Africa. Due to its molecular basis, SCD presents great opportunities for integrating clinical, epidemiological, patho-physiological and genetic research.
MUHAS is a collaborative site for the Malaria Genomic Epidemiology Network (MalariaGEN) Grand Challenges Program which attempts to combine human genome technologies with large-scale epidemiological studies. Dr. Makani is a member of Multi-lateral Initiative on Malaria (MIM) Secretariat Advisory Committee and of the Royal College of Physicians of United Kingdom, and holds an appointment as Clinical Research Fellow at the Nuffield Department of Medicine, University of Oxford.
Bertram Eyakuze, MBA, MPH
Mr. Eyakuze received his B.A.s in Civil Engineering and Economics from Stanford University (California, USA), and his M.B.A from Yale University School of Management (Connecticut, USA). He is a co-founder of Serengeti Advisers. Previously he was a private equity investment professional with CDC Capital Partners, a British company with significant investments across Africa and other developing countries. Prior to returning to Tanzania with CDC he was a management consultant with Mitchell Madison Group in New York, where he was a member of a number of engagement Teams that assisted in strategy formulation and improving the operational efficiency of large multinational companies. Clients included the largest U.S telecommunications provider, a global insurance group, and a leading technology-products manufacturer.
His responsibilities with CDC Capital Partners in Tanzania included the detailed review and improvement of dozens of business plans across all economic sectors with a view to identifying, structuring, negotiating, and completing equity investment opportunities, typically in already-existing enterprises. He also held 8 directorships on various boards of the portfolio companies of CDC Capital Partners, Tanzania Venture Capital Fund, and Fedha Fund.
Reginald Mengi
A chartered accountant by training, Reginald Mengi created the IPP business conglomerate in the mid 1980s after serving as Chairman and Managing Partner of Coopers & Lybrand in Tanzania. In addition to his interests in business and industry, Reginald Mengi has been involved in a number of charities and other social activities, especially in the areas of health, environmental management and poverty alleviation. He has been a leading advocate of involving the private sector in the prevention and treatment of HIV/AIDS, and was appointed member of Tanzania Commission for AIDS (TACAIDS). During his term as a commissioner of TACAIDS, he sparked a nationwide debate over the use and distribution of condoms, giving him the nickname of “Mr. Condom” and putting him in confrontation with Christian and Muslim leaders, after criticizing them for their position against the use of condoms as a central instrument in the fight against the propagation of HIV/AIDS.
In relation to his interests in environmental issues, he is Chairman of the National Environment Management Council ](NEMC), the Poverty Alleviation and Environmental Committee (PAEC), patron of the LEAD Global Environmental Network in Tanzania and treasurer of Leadership for Environment and Development (LEAD) international. This non-governmental, non-profit organization established in 1991 by the Rockefeller Foundation, is committed to sustainable development and provides training for selected mid-career professionals from a variety of sectors in society. He has also been an important sponsor and benefactor of the Kilimanjaro Forestation Campaign and of several projects for youth employment and disabled people. Most recently, Reginald Mengi has begun building The Rodney Mutie Mengi Heart Institute in memory of his son who died on October 6, 2005 from heart complications. In the meantime he has begun sponsoring children in Tanzania with heart problems to travel abroad for treatment.
In recognition to his work, leadership and contributions in a wide range of business and social activities Reginald Mengi has been awarded the Order of the United Republic of Tanzania, the Order of the Arusha Declaration of the First Class for his exemplary contribution to Tanzania’s Development, The East African Environment Leadership Award, and the Environmentalist of the Century Award 2000 in the Kilimanjaro region. Mengi was twice nominated the second most respected Chief Executive Officer in East Africa by PricewaterhouseCoopers (in 2001 and 2002).
Mengi also holds the following positions:
• Chairman of the National Environment Management Council (NEMC) of Tanzania.
• Commissioner of Tanzania Commission for AIDS (TACAIDS).
• Chairman of the Confederation of Tanzania Industries (CTI).
• Investment Committee Chairman of the National Investments Company Limited (NICO).
Mengi has been on the front line in initiating several projects for the disfranchised Tanzania youth. Many believed he would run for presidency as an independent candidate, however he did not and threw his weight behind Jakaya Mrisho Kikwete of CCM who won by a landslide margin.
Christina Vilupti Barrineau
Christina Barrineau is an international advisor on development, specializing in African and Asian regions, and currently works with the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation bolstering their campaign to end deaths by malaria in Africa by 2010. Prior to this she led a number of initiatives for Malaria No More, and was instrumental in securing the 2008 G8 commitment to distribution of 100 million bednets. She established MNM’s operations in the UK and led the 2008 MDG Malaria Summit. She previously worked as the Managing Director of the Financial Access Initiative, a research consortium comprising Harvard, Yale and New York University; at the United Nations where she led the International Year of Micro-credit; and for Woman’s World Banking (WWB) where she established and managed the Global Network for Banking Innovation in Microfinance. Before this, she spent ten years as an independent international advisor to the national governments of Canada, Bulgaria, China, Thailand, Russia, the United Kingdom, the United States, the Netherlands, Kenya, Benin, India, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, Morocco, Jordan, and Angola. She has worked with Dr. Jeffrey Sachs and Dr. Stanley Fischer on issues specific to eradicating poverty. She has pioneered new thinking on pension plans for the poor and asset building models for informal sector workers. Ms Barrineau is a well-known public speaker, holds an MBA from the University of British Columbia, and is a Canadian national.
Joshua Newman, MD, MHSH
Dr. Joshua Newman is a Director of Product Management at Salesforce.com where he works on building and promoting clinical health applications, developing partner presence on the Force.com platform, and enabling health applications for non-profit organizations through the Salesforce foundation. Immediately prior to his work at Salesforce, he was a practicing physician and Assistant Clinical Professor of Medicine at UCLA with a research focus on the application and use of health information technology.
Dr. Newman has a 15-year history in Health IT and has designed, built, and managed numerous web applications including those for medical residency administration, billing, and clinical care; to promote collaboration between physicians; and to enable the adoption of electronic medical records systems.
In 2005, Dr. Newman designed and helped build chicagohealthinfo.com, a prototype website to assist vulnerable populations in finding health care services in Chicago, funded in part by the Chest Foundation of the American College of Chest Physicians. He also designed and launched Wellgram.com: a site to write, rate and send electronic messages for health and well-being. In the course of a RWJ Clinical Scholars Fellowship, he helped design and implement a patient, encounter, and tuberculosis registry for tracking homeless patients. The project, called OpenMRS, is in Los Angeles.
Dr. Newman received his MD from the University of Illinois at Chicago, and completed his residency in Family Medicine at the Advocate Illinois Masonic/UIC program. He completed a Robert Wood Johnson Clinical Scholars Program, a postgraduate fellowship at UCLA, and received an MSHS degree in Health Services. He is Board-certified in Family Medicine and is a member of a number of professional organizations for medicine and technology.
Adam Kushner, MD, MPH
Dr. Kushner is a board certified general surgeon who practices exclusively in developing countries, and co-founder/director of the Society of International Humanitarian Surgeons/Surgeons Overseas. He has worked as a surgeon and educator in Ethiopia, Haiti, India, Liberia, Malawi, Sierra Leone, and Sudan; led landmine assessment missions to Azerbaijan and Kosovo; conducted human rights assessments in Iraq; taught trauma care and landmine injury management in Columbia, Ecuador and Nicaragua; and worked as a health specialist following the 2005 tsunami in Indonesia. Since 2003 he has participated in US military training exercises as a subject matter expert for human rights and humanitarian assistance issues and is a member of the planning committee of the World Health Organization’s Global Initiative on Emergency and Essential Surgical Care.
Dr. Kushner completed his general surgery residency at the University of Texas Health Science Center – San Antonio, has an MD from the Mount Sinai School of Medicine, an M.P.H. from Johns Hopkins University, and a B.A. from Cornell University.
Carol Atwood
Carol Atwood is CEO, Spartacus Media Enterprises and co-founder of Generous Returns, and is a successful entrepreneur who is actively involved in creating, investing in, and participating in socially focused ventures. She has received many awards, including “NYE Entrepreneur of the Year”, sponsored by NASDAQ, Kaufmann Foundation, and Ernst & Young. Carol is the found of Spartacus Media Services, a social mission media company which produces conferences and advisory support for mission-driven media makers and their supporters. She is the CEO of Spartacus Capital, a firm that assists with fund formation to help raise money and facilitate strategic partnerships. Two major focuses of the firm include assisting in the facilitation of socially responsible joint ventures and other business partnerships with Asian companies as well as with global renewable energy buyers and funders. Carol is also committed to many non-profit and socially minded organizations, serving as a member, board member, advisor, or committee head of many of these organizations.
Alisa Swidler
Alisa Swidler is one of the world’s leading activists and campaigners for funding and awareness across a host of aid and health related issues in the developing world.
In the past 5 years, Alisa has partnered with both The President William Jefferson Clinton Foundation to provide access to vaccines in Liberia and Timor Leste and with Sir Richard Branson’s foundation, Virgin Unite, advising their civil society work in Zimbabwe.
She is a Trustee of The Walkabout Foundation which distributes wheelchairs in developing countries and an Ambassador to Prince William’s Centrepoint, the UK charity for homeless youth. Her most recent appointments include Global Ambassador with Cate Blanchett for Solar Century’s SolarAid. She has also been named a Trustee of Jeffrey Sachs’ Millennium Promise and of The Gates-funded Sabin Vaccine Institute and The Global Network for Neglected Tropical Diseases in Washington DC. Alisa has 5 young children and lives outside of London.
Cynthia Ryan
Cynthia Ryan is Principal of The Schooner Foundation, a progressive family foundation that focuses internationally on human rights, peace & security and economic opportunity. Domestically, the foundation supports progressive media, campaign finance reform, the green economy, investigative reporting, and judicial reform. They seek to honor human dignity, think big, and act where trustees see the greatest need and opportunities for leverage locally, nationally and globally. Ms. Ryan is a current or former trustee of the Fund for Global Human Rights, the Nation Institute, the Ploughshares Fund, Green for All, Women for Women International, National Braille Press, and the National Association of Health Education Centers. She is an advisory board member of the Lake Tanganyika Floating Health Clinic and The Foundry 47 Foundation. She is a member of the Clinton Global Initiative, Global Philanthropy Forum, Peace & Security Funders Group, the International Human Rights Funders Group, and Grantmakers Without Borders. She has served on the Women’s Leadership Board and the Carr Center for Human Rights Policy, both at the John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University. She was the Outreach Chair of the Advisory Committee of the Women’s Rights Division at Human Rights Watch. She is currently a partner in the Democracy Alliance. Cynthia received her Bachelor of Arts from the New School for Social Research in New York and a Masters of Arts from the School of Oriental & African Studies at the University of London in England. She is a contributing author in the book, Women, Philanthropy and Social Change: Visions for a Just Society. Cynthia currently resides in Washington, D.C.