Comfort Idika Ogunye

Comfort Idika Ogunye [BA Ilr; LLB Jos; BL] was born in 1969 in Iyuku, Etsako West Local Government Area of Edo State. She attended S.I.M Primary School, Kano [1973-1979]; Federal Government College, Kano, [1980-1985]; University of Ilorin, Kwara State,[1987-1991]; University of Jos, Jos Plateau State, [1992-1997]; and the Nigerian Law School, Bwari-Abuja, Federal Capital Territory, [1998-1999]. She was called to the Nigerian Bar in September 1999, remarkably winning the prestigious (Trophy and Prize in Advocacy) in the Nigerian Law School Bar Final Examination of that year. In 2000, she joined Jiti Ogunye Chambers.

In addition to her professional commitments, Mrs. Ogunye has been very active in the Nigerian civil society and in the women movement. In her university days, she worked extensively in the women and students movements, becoming the first and till date the only female President of the National Association of Nigerian Students (NANS) (1995-1996). From 1989 to 1990, she was the University of Ilorin Unit Coordinator of Women in Nigeria (WIN), until recently the mainstream women organization in Nigeria. Between 1995 and 1997, she was the Public Relations Secretary of the Plateau State Branch of WIN. In 1996, she spearheaded the formation of the Female Activists Forum (FAF), now Female Leadership Forum (FLF). In May 1999, she was elected into the National Executive Committee of the Committee for the Defence of Human Rights (CDHR), a then leading human rights NGO in Nigeria as the Assistant Secretary General. She became the Acting Secretary – General of the CDHR in May 2000 and stepped out of the Executive Committee of the CDHR in May 2001.In 2001, she established Female Leadership Forum (FLF) as a duly registered women NGO dedicated to the empowerment and capacity building of young women to enable them play leadership roles in the social, economic and political spheres of their micro environments, and to be motivated, using those roles as a stepping ladder, to play bigger roles in the social, economic and political lives of Nigeria in the future

In the past fourteen (14) years, Mrs. Comfort Idika Ogunye has worked as the principal grants administration, accounting and reporting executive for her organization, the Female Leadership Forum, which has received funding supports from the Ford Foundation, the Open Society Initiative for West Africa (OSIWA), the European Union, the African Women Development Fund, Fix Nigeria Initiative (the interface between the Nigeria’s anti-corruption body-Economic and Financial Crimes Commission-and Nigerian civil society organizations), Global Rights, Nigeria, the Urgent Action Fund, based in Kenya, the Canadian International Development Agency (CIDA), and DFID, UK.