Africa

Amandine Gnanguênon is a GMF Risk and Strategy nonresident fellow, and a senior fellow and head of the Africa Policy Research Institute’s (APRI) Geopolitics and Geoeconomics Program. She is also an associate research fellow at the United Nations University Institute on Comparative Regional Integration Studies.

Before joining APRI, Gnanguênon was an independent adviser to governments, think tanks, German foundations, African regional organizations, the EU, and the UN. She also worked at the European Council on Foreign Relations and the Institute of Security Studies in Dakar. She established and led the sub-Saharan Africa program at the Institute of Strategic Research at the École Militaire in Paris.

Gnanguênon’s research and analysis has been published on academic, policy, and media platforms. Her areas of focus include regional integration, peace and security, governance, digitalization, climate-related issues, and EU-Africa cooperation. 

Nigina Malikova Valentini was formerly Associate Director, Assessment, Monitoring & Evaluation at GMF.

Hermine Sam is a Brussels-based program coordinator for GMF South. Her research interests include regional integration and geopolitical competition in West Africa.

Sam has developed and hosted several podcasts, including the “EXTRA2020” series for the French embassy in Belgium and the “Thinking Across Latitudes” mini-series, which explores global trends through a southern Atlantic and Mediterranean perspective.

Sam holds a bachelor’s degree in political science and a master’s degree in political communication from the Université Libre de Bruxelles.