Ajra believes in this one life tip: when you do good deeds, and sincerely, then the left hand should not know what the right hand has given out.
“I rarely look for the spotlight,” she says.
She has defied the odds of poverty.
“I came from a humble background, but I have been quite privileged in my life. I was sponsored through high school and university. I got a Chevening scholarship for my first Master’s degree and the Queen Elizabeth Commonwealth Scholarship for my second Master’s. I have been blessed, and this is how I give back, by paying it forward,” she says.
"We want to get more women in positions of power and specifically, women from the grassroots. They know the solutions required to solve problems."
What she does, through Nguvu Collective, is to support emerging women leaders from marginalised communities through advocacy training and extensive campaign support.
“We want women to reclaim power in spaces where they face injustices and have been excluded. Most of our change leaders work across health, gender rights, sanitation, climate change, and education,” she says.
“We want to get more women in positions of power and specifically, women from the grassroots. They know the solutions required to solve problems.”
She aspires to make women more confident. “Sometimes, as women, we tend to be perfectionists. A man would apply for a job, even if they just had 60 percent of the qualifications. Women tend to want to be overqualified first,” Ajra says.
She admits to suffering from imposter syndrome, something that has been buttressed by “mentors who came into my life at different stages.”
– Eddy Ashioya
