Who We Are

Ekanem holds a bachelor of science in biochemistry from the University of Calabar (Nigeria). He earned certificates in Leadership and Management in Global Health and Project Management in Global Health from the University of Washington. He attended a short course on Improving the Health of Women, Children, and Adolescents: From Evidence to Action at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine. And graduated from the Human Rights Advocates Program at Columbia University, Institute for the Study of Human Rights, New-York, USA. Ekanem has managed and implemented advocacy, high-impact and evidence-based programs around sexual and reproductive health and rights, HIV/AIDS preventions, and malaria and TB interventions. He has influenced policies and laws that facilitate and sustain social change in the areas of health, protection, and education geared towards achieving the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). He developed a scorecard to monitor the implementation of the SDGs across 11 states of Nigeria, which young people rely on as evidence for their advocacy. Previously, he worked for the National Agency for the Control of AIDS on the diagnosis and treatment of pulmonary tuberculosis in HIV patients in Nigeria. He was involved in the collection of data on key selected parameters on HIV and TB from selected facilities across the country. The findings showed huge disparities in access to prompt diagnosis of treatment for HIV and TB. Currently, he is the UNAIDS Youth Leader for West and Central Africa and the Advocacy working group lead for The PACT, a global coalition of youth-led and youth-serving organizations working within the sexual and reproductive health and HIV movement. Ekanem was recently nominated as Civil Society (CSO) Representative on the UNAIDS Monitoring Technical Advisory Group (MTAG), a Global expert body, which coordinates and makes technical recommendations on indicator development, revisions, harmonization, and reviews of M&E data to guide program management and for impact assessment. MTAG has served UNAIDS as an independent global body of experts that leads the thinking and provides advice in matters related to monitoring and evaluation (M&E) of the global AIDS response. Ekanem is currently a board member of the Initiative for Rights and Gender Equality (INRIGE), a youth-led organization established in 2020 whose primary focus is the protection, promotion, and fulfillment of the rights, meaningful inclusion, and programming of LBQTI women.