Adelaide Sosseh
International Advisory Council /

Adelaide Sosseh

Adelaide Sosseh is an educator, gender specialist and human rights advocate. She recently served as the Deputy Chairperson of The Gambia’s Truth, Reconciliation and Reparations Commission (TRRC) set up by government to establish the historical record of human rights violations committed during the 22 years of the Jammeh regime, promote national reconciliation, and consider the granting of reparation to victims. 

Mrs. Sosseh is a former Director of Schools (1990-1993) and had served in various roles in the education sector before rising to the position of Director under the restructured Ministry of Education. From there, she transited to Women’s Affairs and worked under the Office of the President as Project Manager of the multi-donor Women in Development Project (1993-1995). 

Post government, Mrs. Sosseh became an active member of civil society and was appointed Executive Director of Worldview The Gambia, a communications development agency in 1999, a position she held until 2010.  She also founded or chaired several civil society organisations at the national, regional and global levels, including the Education for all Campaign Network (EFANet), as founder and chairperson (2000-2010); the Pro-Poor Advocacy Group (Pro-PAG), as founder and chairperson (2000-2009);  the National Human Rights Defenders, as founder and Secretary General (2000-2006); The Gambia Red Cross Society, as Member of the Executive Board (2004-2007); Amnesty International The Gambia, as member (2000-2005); and the Global Campaign against Poverty (GCAP), inculding as Global Co-Chair (2005-2010) and Ambassador (2010 to date).

Mrs. Sosseh has also served as the Executive Director of the GAM Africa Institute for Leadership (GAIL): an organisation focused on developing the leadership capacities of emerging youth leaders. At the regional level she served as a resource expert for the ECOWAS Gender Development Centre (EGDC) from 2005-2016, conducting gender training in all the ECOWAS countries and developing gender training manuals for the region. At the global level she served on the Global Advisory Committee for UN Girls Education (UNGEI GAC) and as a Representative of the Africa Campaign Network on Education for All (ANCEFA).

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