Leaders and technical experts who have drafted law, trained administrations, and sat where fiscal decisions are contested — across Africa and beyond.
Academy leadership
Heads of the Academy
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Dr Lyla Latif
Head of the Academy
Pan-African lawyer, academic and policy strategist spanning public finance, international taxation, legislative reform and technology governance.
Dr Lyla Latif co-developed Africa’s first anti–illicit financial flows policy tracker, enabling countries to evaluate laws, regulatory practice, institutional readiness, data exchange and international cooperation to protect fiscal space. Appointed to Kenya’s Ministry of Information, Communications and the Digital Economy, she helped steer national strategy on emerging technologies and public data governance. As a UNDP technical expert (2023–2025), she drafted income tax laws and national tax policies, and trained governments on international taxation and domestic resource mobilisation. Earlier she drafted Kenya’s land legislation that replaced colonial-era statutes. She serves as in-house expert counsel to Eswatini’s Revenue Appeals Tribunal on international tax disputes, and has trained tax administrations, parliamentarians, ministries of finance, judges, civil society, trade unions and journalists across four continents. Her work also advances Islamic financial instruments for deeper domestic development approaches. She has lectured at Bhutan’s JSW Law School, KoGuan Law School in China, University of Colombo, University of Lomé, and in the UK (Cardiff, Warwick Law School, LSE); created a TED-Ed video viewed by more than half a million people; spoken alongside a Nobel laureate on illicit financial flows; and collaborated with Nobel Peace Prize laureate Lech Wałęsa to redefine global fiscal justice. Recognised by the Chartered Institute of Taxation of Nigeria for her contribution to tax scholarship, she brings a decolonial, pan-African lens to global debates and translates comparative legal analysis into practical reform.
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Dr Saied Tafida Sulaiman
Co-Lead Head of the Academy
Almost two decades at the intersection of financing, governance reform and development strategy — positioning fiscal policy for recovery, resilience and inclusive growth.
As Regional Coordinator at UNDP, and in previous leadership roles across multinational and national institutions, Dr Sulaiman leads the design and operationalisation of SDGs financing frameworks. His work integrates impact investment structuring, domestic revenue reform, expenditure rationalisation and innovative financing instruments. In reforming and fragile contexts he focuses on rebuilding fiscal credibility while restoring essential services and strengthening state legitimacy. He convenes ministries of finance, revenue authorities, development partners, private sector and civil society around politically feasible reforms, and has mobilised public and private capital for health, education and human capital. Recognised by the Gates Foundation as an SDGs Goalkeeper and acknowledged by former US President Barack Obama and Special Presidential Envoy John Kerry as a Young African Leader.
James Maingi
Lead, Strategy & Partnerships
James Maingi
Lead, Strategy & Partnerships
Strategic communications, partnerships and storytelling at the intersection of government, development institutions, the private sector and civil society.
James Maingi specialises in translating complex public policy, governance and public finance issues into clear, compelling and accessible narratives for diverse audiences. His work spans strategic communications, institutional positioning, stakeholder engagement, partnership development and policy storytelling. He is co-founder of Budget Ndio Story, an initiative that uses innovative storytelling to make budgets, public finance and economic policy more understandable and relevant to citizens. His experience includes developing storytelling and communications around digital public financial management reforms for the Collaborative Africa Budget Reform Initiative (CABRI). He has worked across sectors to strengthen institutional visibility, deepen stakeholder engagement and connect technical policy issues with broader public and development conversations.
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Shem Ojunga
Lead Communications
Seasoned media and strategic communications professional with over 14 years spanning broadcast production, documentary filmmaking, digital communication, institutional storytelling and public-interest communication.
His career has been built at the intersection of media, communication and social impact, working across television, digital platforms, development communication and institutional media. Shem brings extensive experience in translating complex ideas into compelling narratives that inform, engage and influence diverse audiences. He has worked with leading media institutions and organisations across Africa and internationally, contributing to high-level productions, documentaries, corporate profiles, live broadcasts and strategic communication initiatives. His professional experience spans Kenya and the wider region, with expertise in visual storytelling, multimedia production, communication strategy and audience engagement. As Director of Communications at CENTS Governance Academy (CGA), Shem leads the organisation’s communication and storytelling agenda, supporting its mission to make critical conversations around public finance, governance, technology, accountability and Africa’s development more accessible and engaging. He is particularly passionate about using the power of media and strategic storytelling to bridge the gap between complex policy issues and ordinary citizens. His work focuses on transforming technical information into accessible narratives that inspire understanding, participation and action. Shem believes that effective communication is not merely about visibility, but about making knowledge accessible, institutions accountable and citizens better informed. At CGA, he brings this philosophy into building a strong communication ecosystem that amplifies ideas, research, learning and conversations shaping the future of governance and public resources in Africa. His expertise includes strategic communication, documentary production, broadcast media, digital storytelling, institutional communication, content strategy, multimedia production and public engagement. At CENTS Governance Academy, Shem is committed to using communication as a tool for knowledge, accountability and transformation.
Technical experts
Faculty who bring the frontier into the room
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Dr Afrika Kiiza
Trade and investment policy specialist with extensive experience in research, advocacy, regional integration and international trade negotiations across Africa.
Dr Kiiza has contributed to major continental, regional and multilateral negotiations including the WTO, AfCFTA, the EAC-COMESA-SADC Tripartite FTA, and EU-ACP Economic Partnership Agreements. He has participated in Uganda’s official WTO Ministerial delegations and contributed to Uganda’s and the EAC’s AfCFTA implementation strategies, including emerging work on the AfCFTA Protocol on Digital Trade. He designs and facilitates capacity-building programmes for government, private sector and civil society, and authors policy briefs and negotiation positions used at national and regional levels. Fluent in English and Kiswahili, with conversational French and Spanish.
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Dr Micah Gaalya
Manager, Digital Content Development at Uganda Revenue Authority; former Acting Commissioner, Tax Education at URA.
Technical expert on digitalisation of tax systems at the UNDP Tax for SDGs Initiative. Brings revenue-authority experience in tax education, digital content and the practical rollout of technology inside tax administrations.
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Francis Kaburu
Kenyan legal scholar, lecturer and researcher in public finance law, financial regulation, taxation, banking, securities and regional economic integration.
Lecturer in the Department of Public Law, Faculty of Law, University of Nairobi. Holds an LL.M. in Public Finance and Financial Services Law and an LL.B. from the University of Nairobi. His research and teaching span fiscal decentralisation, financial sector regulation, anti-money laundering, securities regulation, taxation and the legal and policy dimensions of the East African Community Monetary Union.
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Dr Nimmo Elmi
Tax policy expert with over 10 years in taxation and 15 years in development; PhD on the impact of digitalisation on tax compliance in Kenya.
Formerly lead knowledge management and research at the African Center of Tax and Governance (ACTG). Collaborates with international and local tax research institutions and revenue authorities in Kenya and Nigeria, and consults for bilateral and multilateral organisations. PhD from Linköping University (Sweden) on postcolonial technoscience in iTax implementation in Kenya, within the EU Horizon 2020 fair tax project. Worked extensively on development projects in Kenya and Somalia, including the technical committee of the Somalia fiscal federalism agreement passed in Baidoa in 2023.
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Haniya Usman
Operations manager with over 20 years across public and private sectors including anti-money laundering / counter-terrorism financing, insurance, IFF and DRM.
Brings analytical depth and operational experience spanning compliance, illicit financial flows and domestic resource mobilisation — supporting programme delivery and institutional readiness.
Mariéme Gnagna THIAM
Mariéme Gnagna THIAM
THIAM holds a Ph.D. in public law and specializes in public finance and taxation. Her dissertation, titled “The Interpretation of Tax Law in Francophone Black African States: The Cases of Benin, Mali, and Senegal,” forms the academic foundation of her expertise.
She is currently a lecturer at Cheikh Anta Diop University in Dakar, where she teaches public finance, local finance, tax law, and tax policy. Her courses incorporate innovative approaches, including gender-sensitive taxation, digital taxation, public debt, and more.
In addition to her academic career, she serves as Head of the Public Finance Department at the International Budget Partnership for Francophone Africa. In this role, she advises governments, parliaments, supreme audit institutions, and civil society organizations on emerging public finance issues, such as budget transparency, open budgeting, tax optimization policies, public debt accountability, citizen participation, as well as gender- and climate-sensitive budgeting. Previously, as Senior Program Coordinator for the Tax Equity program, she supported initiatives to mobilize domestic revenue and helped promote tax compliance to finance sustainable development.
Her career also includes experience at the National Assembly of Senegal, where she served as a parliamentary assistant to the Committee on Finance and Budgetary Oversight, focusing on tax issues. There, she strengthened her expertise in parliamentary and budgetary law, parliamentary practice, and the law governing political institutions.
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Maarten Hietland
A researcher and specialist in international taxation, corporate tax avoidance and the political economy of natural resource extraction, with extensive experience examining how multinational corporations, fiscal systems and public policy interact.
He works with the Centre for Research on Multinational Corporations (SOMO) in the Netherlands, where his research focuses on corporate tax practices and the governance and economic implications of natural resource extraction. His work brings together international economics, political economy and public policy, with particular attention to how governments can better understand and respond to complex cross-border fiscal and corporate issues.
Before joining SOMO in 2019, Maarten worked with Oxfam Novib as a researcher and policy adviser on taxation and inequality. He also contributes to academia as a supervisor of Bachelor’s theses in International Economics at Radboud University and works independently on research and advisory assignments.
Maarten holds a Bachelor’s degree in Political Science from Radboud University Nijmegen, a Master’s degree in International Relations from the University of Amsterdam, and a Master’s degree in International Economics from Utrecht University.
At Cents Governance Academy (CGA), Maarten brings expertise at the intersection of taxation, economics, corporate accountability and natural-resource governance, contributing to CGA’s work in strengthening the capacity of public institutions to navigate increasingly complex fiscal, investment and governance challenges.
