Description of Award

Comrade Mawina Kouyate was a founding member of the All African Women’s Revolutionary Union (A-AWRU), the women’s wing of the A-APRP. She dedicated over 29 years of her life to building the A-APRP and the A-AWRU. Comrade Mawina was an outstanding organizer and was highly respected by all who came to know and work with her. She made her transition into the ancestral realm in September 2002.

Sista Mawina Kouyate will forever be remembered for her Revolutionary African personality, her revolutionary love and her revolutionary commitment to humanity and especially to the African masses. We give thanks to the Almighty Creator for sending her to us and for her exceptional revolutionary contribution to the upliftment and advancement of our peoples sacred liberation movement. On behalf of the All-African People’s Revolutionary Party and the All African Women’s Revolutionary Union we raise our voices high in honor of Sista Mawina. And to our family, friends, comrades and all freedom loving militants who were blessed to have known her and to have been touched by her life and powerful inspiration, we bring you these few words in her honor.

The purpose of the Daughters of Africa Award is to elevate the position of African women and reinforce their revolutionary role, especially in the Pan African and/or socialist movements.  This year’s Mawina Kouyate Daughter of Africa award goest to Wanjira Wanjiru.

Wanjira Wanjiru Bio

WANJIRA WANJIRU is a grassroots activist who co-founded the Mathare Social Justice Centre and the Matigari Youth Book Club. She is a BA student at the University of Nairobi and co-host of the Liberating Minds podcast on YouTube and SoundCloud. Wanjira was nominated as human rights defender of the year in 2020 for raising awareness about extrajudicial killings by the police, and has been featured in Al Jazeera’s Generation Change, the Guardian, and the New Humanitarian. RASNA WARAH spoke to her about her work in Mathare and the challenges facing female activists in Kenya.