African Voices Feature Female Change Agents

Two women, Yvonne Anuli Orji and Anifa Mvuemba whose talents in the arts have projected them unto the world stage will this week appear on African Voices Changemakers, the CNN magazine programme sponsored by Globacom.

Orji is a Nigerian-American actress reputed for her role as Molly in the Home Box Office series Insecure, and Mvuemba, a Congolese creator of fashion label, Hanifa, whose 3D runway fashion show recently took the world by storm are the guests.

Born on December 2, 1983, in Port Harcourt, Rivers State, Nigeria, Orji relocated with her family to Maryland in the United States of America when she was six years old. Her parents, like most Africans nursed the dream of their daughter becoming a medical doctor, lawyer, pharmacist, or engineer, but she was drawn to comedy as a graduate student when she performed stand-up in the talent portion of a beauty pageant. She subsequently decided to pursue a career in comedy after graduating from George Washington University with multiple degrees including a Masters in Public Health to the delight of her parents.

According to a statement by Globacom, she was at TEDx Wilmington Salon in 2017 to talk about “The wait is sexy” where she explained her reasons for abstaining from sex before marriage. Her works include Love that Girl, 2011 Sex (Therapy) With the Jones (2013), Jane the Virgin, 2017 and the soar-away television series Insecure which has aired since 2016.

Mvuemba, 29, who created the fashion label Hanifa also moved with her family to America from the Democratic Republic of Congo when she was a toddler. Her current fashion line dubbed Pink Label Congo was inspired by her homeland.