Yona
Wanjala, CAMS
Yona Wanjala is the current Executive Director of the Defenders Protection Initiative. He has more than 15 years of experience in Risk Assessment and Promotion of a safer working environment for Social Justice Leaders-SJL in Africa and some South-East Asia countries.
Previously, he worked with Protection International as a Risk Assessment and Protection Officer in the East and Horn of Africa Region, where he led initiatives geared at responding to operational risk for Social Justice Leaders focused on providing technical support on the planning and executing security and protection management activities.
Yona is a member of the Global NPO Coalition on FATF, a network of diverse non-profit organizations (NPOs) globally that advocates for a risk-based implementation of FATF Recommendations affecting NPOs, particularly Recommendation 8. As a member of the Global NPO - Expert Hub, a working group of the Global NPO Coalition on FATF, Yona has conducted awareness training on AML/CFT to civil society initiatives in the West, East, and Southern Africa.
Through his leadership at DPI, the organization has championed NGO-sectoral awareness raising on ML/TF, established the National NPO working groups on FATF, organized a number of strategic engagements with AML/CFT regulators, and conducted several studies on gaps and implications of the AML/CFT regulatory framework on the NPO sector. He is involved in charitable and professional causes.
Yona is a Certified Anti-Money Laundering Specialist with the ACAMS; he holds a Bachelor’s Degree in Development Studies and a Master’s in International Relations and Diplomacy from Nkumba University. Additionally, Yona holds a MA. In International Security Studies from the University of Leicester-United Kingdom, and a Diploma in Law from the Law Development Center.