Ibijoke Faborode, a Public Policy advisor driving women inclusiveness in politics
Ibijoke Faborode is a trisector leader with over 13 years of experience spanning gender relations, research and public policy advisory, election and governance, high-level government relations, development program management, civic innovation, advertising and media relations.
Faborode is the Founder and Chief Executive Officer of ElectHER, an impact-driven non-governmental organization, advancing the inclusion of women in politics and public life through research and policy innovation, behavioral change communications, community building, capacity development, tech innovation and resource mobilization.
With a demonstrated history of working in the public policy industry, Faborode has skills in negotiation, business planning, international relations, market research, and management. She is passionate about social innovation design and always looking to collaborate with solutions that tackle inequality and poverty in Africa.
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In its bid to address the under-representation of women in politics across Africa, ElectHER has shown commitment to increasing women’s political inclusion across Africa. They do this through behavioural change communications, community building, capacity development, and increased access to social, human, technological and financial capital.
ElectHER launched Agender35, through which it is supported forward-thinking Nigerian women to run for office and win elections in 2023. They eventually unveiled eight aspirants vying for state and federal legislative seats in the 2023 general election across political parties.
Some other core initiatives of the organization include the ElectHER Policy and Research Center, which drives the ideation, design and implementation of evidence-based research; the ElectHER Election Hub, launched during the 2023 Nigerian presidential election to manage observation deployment, data management, analytics and public engagement; the ElectHER Future Lawmakers Program, a leadership and legislative fellowship for women aspiring to legislative office; OBINRIN, an annual event intersecting the arts, gender and citizen action; and Hernalytics, a mobile and web tech platform to enhance the social aspect of governance through data, information and community.
Favorite completed a bachelor’s degree in History and International Relations from Obafemi Awolowo University and a master’s degree in Project Management from France. She also has an executive certification in business analytics from Imperial Business School and she is currently enrolled in an executive master’s programme in social business and entrepreneurship at the London School of Economics and Political Science (LSE).
Before ElectHER, Faborode worked with the UK Foreign and Commonwealth Office, leading on policy, trade, and investment relations across West Africa, and with a Paris-based Pan-African publication- The Africa Report, where she led communication campaigns for governments and some of the biggest brands in Africa.
Faborode was one of two Nigerian women to be named in the BBC’s top 100 influential and aspiring women of 2022. In addition, she recently featured among Global Citizen’s 18 global activists to look out for in 2023. She is a member of the Democracy & Culture Foundation’s Global Leadership Council and has previously served in various capacities locally and globally on key engagements across public policy, gender, governance, democracy and civic innovation.
She is also a One Young World 2019 Dutch MFA Scholar and a 2019 Public Service Nominee for The Future Awards Africa.