Articles courtesy of AfricanFeminism

“Portuguese-speaking Africa is not on the margins of Africa’s feminist movement. It is an essential part of it.”

Across Africa, feminist movements have long challenged systems of inequality, responded to crises, created new possibilities for minoritized and excluded communities. Philanthropy has been integral to advances toward just and equal African societies. Yet within the current global and continental landscape of feminist philanthropy, some communities and movements remain largely unseen.

The Portuguese-speaking African countries that include Angola, Cabo Verde, Guinea-Bissau, Mozambique, Equatorial Guinea and São Tomé and Principe, represent diverse histories, political realities and social contexts. Their feminist movements are dynamic, innovative and deeply rooted in their communities. They are advancing gender justice in contexts shaped by economic deprivation and inequality, climate change, difficult democratic transitions, shrinking civic space and gender-based violence.

Despite this important work, these movements continue to face significant barriers to accessing resources, networks and spaces where Africa’s feminist priorities are shaped. The challenge is not a lack of organizing. It is a fragmented funding ecosystem that has not yet fully recognized or responded to the diversity of Africa’s feminist movements.

The cost of being overlooked

“This is not simply a language issue. It is a question of equity, power, and whose movements are seen as worthy of sustained investment.”

Language is often treated as a technical issue within philanthropy. But colonial imagined and erected linguistic borders, in reality, determine who participates, whose knowledge is shared, and which movements can access opportunities. Many continental funding opportunities, convenings, research publications and learning spaces are designed primarily in English or, to a lesser extent, French. Organizations from Portuguese-speaking countries frequently face additional costs related to translation, interpretation and participation — costs that are rarely built into funding models.

The result is a structural barrier: organizations with valuable expertise and strong community connections may remain disconnected from funding opportunities, regional conversations and shared learnings, not because of limited impact but because systems were not designed with their inclusion in mind. For philanthropy, this raises a fundamental question: What does meaningful inclusion look like when funding systems themselves create barriers to participation?

Listening before investing

At the African Women’s Development Fund (AWDF), we recognized that addressing this gap required more than acknowledging the challenge. It required listening, evidence and a deeper understanding of how feminist movements in Portuguese-speaking Africa organize, sustain themselves and envision their futures.

AWDF undertook a mapping of feminist movements and funding landscapes across Portuguese-speaking Africa to better understand not only the barriers facing these movements, but also the opportunities for philanthropy to engage differently. We asked: What does feminist organizing and funding actually look like across Portuguese-speaking Africa, and what would it take to strengthen these movements for the long term?

The findings provide an important reminder that communities and movements that have historically been overlooked are not waiting to be built. They are already organizing, innovating and creating solutions. What is needed is a funding ecosystem that recognizes their leadership and invests accordingly.

Feminist movements creating new pathways for change… Read more

This article is written by Nana Zulu, Interim CEO of AWDF. and was first published by Africanfeminis.com. It forms part of the AWDF thoughtleadership work on resourcing and nurturing feminist grassroots organisations in French and Portuguese speaking  Africa.