Effective August 1st, 2023, Clean Up Kenya is making radical changes to its organizational structure. The Advisory Board which has been in place for the last three years will be dissolved and in its place three councils will be formed.
The three councils to be formed are the Advisory Council, Youth Council, and the Children’s Council. Each of these Councils will have up to seven members. Additionally, a new administrative office has been created, namely the Office of the Executive Secretary which will coordinate the work of these councils.
The Advisory Council will be the highest decision-making organ of Clean Up Kenya and will be led by Ruth Anyango Okinyo as the Chairperson (first in the picture). Ruth Anyango is a sustainable seamstress and a cloth upcycling enthusiast. She has been an active member of the Clean Up Kenya Coalition since 2021.
The Youth Council will be led by Janet Chemitei (second in the picture) in an Acting capacity as members of this Council will be between the ages of 14 years to 24 years. Janet is an environmentalist who is passionate about climate and social justice and youth development. She is the Africa Regional Coordinator at Threading Change.
The Children’s Council will be chaired by Jada Neema (third in the picture) and will have members aged below 14 years. Jada (10 years) was appointed to the Clean Up Kenya Advisory Board in 2021 to represent the interests of children. She speaks powerfully about the issues of marine pollution.
Additionally to the Youth and Children Council Chairpersons being also members of the Advisory Council, this council will also have a Media and Government Relations Advisor, Corporate Relations Advisor, Faith Based Organisations Relations Advisor, Circular Economy and Sustainability Advisor, Community Relations and Sports Advisor, and Coastal Areas Advisor.
The appointed Chairpersons are in the process of constituting their councils and these members will be announced before 1st August 2023 together with the office holders for the Office of the Country Director and the Office of the Executive Secretary.
Martin Muriithi, who was previously the Advisory Board Chairperson will now serve as a Trustee and Patron in the new structure.
Commenting on the new structure, Clean Up Kenya Founder and Patron, Betterman Simidi Musasia has observed, “Our structure represents a fulfillment of a commitment we made three years ago of intentional transition to a youthful leadership.”
ABOUT CLEAN UP KENYA
Clean Up Kenya was established in 2015 to advocate for and promote sustainable public sanitation in Kenya. Since then we have become the de-facto national public sanitation advocacy brand. We are also experts in community mobilizing for cleanups. We have done numerous cleanups over the years, some of which have been attended by over 1000 volunteers on singular sites. These cleanups are meant to increase visibility on the problem of waste and it is therefore common to see our volunteers in bibs with one message, ‘Clean Up Kenya’. At the core of our work is honest and actual engagement in communities – not PR events. We also run advocacy campaigns holding duty bodies, consumer brands, green-washing NGOs, and other stakeholders to account for unsustainable public sanitation in Kenya and the global South. We receive no funding for our work but collaborate with others on projects.
