Women, Leadership & Democracy

Joining us for this episode is Zainab Olaitan. Zainab Olaitan is a PhD candidate in the department of political sciences, University of Pretoria where she is researching the impact of gender quotas on the substantive representation of women in African politics. She obtained her first degree in Bachelor of Science (Hons) in Political Science with First class honours from the University of Lagos. Zainab completed her second degree in Philosophy, Politics and Economics Honors at the University of Cape Town as a 2018 Mandela Rhodes Scholar. In 2019, she got the MasterCard foundation scholarship to complete a master’s degree in Political Sciences at the University of Pretoria. In 2022, she was awarded the Margaret McNamara Education Grant for her impactful research work on women and children. Zainab is an avid researcher with published articles in local and international journals" and is keenly interested in contributing to research on gender and representation, conflict and peace studies and political thought.