Country of Origin: Sudan

Main Focus: Feminist Activism, Women's Rights

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Fahima Hashim is a Sudanese feminist and activist, now living in Ottawa-Canada. She was one of the founders and director of Salmmah Women’s Resource Centre in Khartoum, Sudan, until government forces - under the then-president Omar al-Bashir - closed it down in June 2014. Fahima continues her activism to advocate for women, raise money for feminist causes, and mentor pro-democracy activists online.

Fahima was born in the city of Omdurman, on the west bank of the Nile. She was one of the founders of Salmmah Women’s Resource Centre in 1997. However, in 1998 she took part in a workshop titled “Gender and Sustainable Development in South Asia” that would transform and accelerate her feminism and activism. The workshop took place in Bangladesh and was attended by 30 activists and trainers from different countries in South Asia.

Fahima would later say of the training that it was “instrumental in shaping a new self, which was stronger, clearer and more committed to the kind of work I envisioned myself doing, as well as the kind of women/person I wanted to be. I went back home with a new vision, knowledge and my feminist identity.”

In 1999, through Salmmah, she organized the first residential training in Sudan, trying to bring and contextualize and localize her feminist learning. Consequently, she was faced with threats from security. She then decided to take a sabbatical from Salmmah and go back to India to learn and consolidate her feminist knowledge. She then joined Jagori and an Indian Feminist organization (1999-2001); learning from this experience, Fahima explained:

From my cultural context, family is the most important thing, and it is typically determined based on blood relations only. Feminism has brought me a larger, richer and more diverse chosen family – an alternative family based on shared values of love, acceptance, and inclusion that do not depend on nationality, blood, gender identity, sexual identity, religious or political affiliation. I have personally experienced the individual transformative power of this type of family and the collective power that it generates for transformative change in our societies.

For her, a feminist approach is ultimately always about transformative change – whether at the political, cultural, familial or individual level or all four – and learning is at the heart of any transformative journey. Feminist change is inherently transformative. It is creative and life-giving because it depends on diversity, deep listening, deep caring, tolerance, creativity, and the openness (and excitement) to be surprised by where you land and how you land to get there.

In 2005, as the government in Khartoum negotiated a peace agreement with the Sudan Peoples’ Liberation Movement/Army SPLM/SPLA, a decades-long civil war was beginning to end between North and South Sudan. Fahima and her allies moved to take advantage of the new political mood. Their main focuses were twofold - cases of violence against women in Sudan and reforms of the laws that denied women their right to safety and dignity.

They also used the media to highlight the situation of women in Sudan in general and particularly in conflict areas to advocate for legal reform. They formed 149 Alliance with other human rights and feminist organizations. Together they worked to focus international concern on the use of rape as a weapon of war and systematic and legal suppression of women throughout the country.

Al Salmmah’s successes were recognized internationally. They worked with partners from across the globe. They were the lead organizers for Khartoum-based International Women’s Day celebrations, One Billion Rising gatherings, and campaigns related to the 16 Days of Action Against Gender Violence. The centre also played a leading role in researching, documenting and disseminating knowledge on women’s rights and human rights in Sudan.

However, on Tuesday, June 24th, 2014, without warning, due process or explanation, the Sudanese government shut down Salmmah Centre, closing its offices, confiscating equipment and impounding its vehicles.

In the wake of this incident, Fahima left Sudan for Canada, working first as a Visiting Scholar at Risk at the Centre for Feminist Research, York University, Toronto, before initiating the Arabic language Farida Bookstore Inc.

Fahima continues to research, write and campaign for women’s rights from her home in Ottawa. She works as a consultant with the Nobel Women’s Initiative, an Ottawa-based women's organization.

She currently serves on two Boards of Directors: Nazra for Feminist Studies and the Doria Feminist Fund, the first feminist fund in the Middle East and North Africa devoted to supporting young feminists in the region. Engaging in the governance and programming of these two important regional feminist organizations kept her engaged.

With Nazra, she is able to continue to build the capacity of young women in the MENA region and organize, facilitate, and act as a mentor for a school for young feminists in Sudan. She has also been an active Women Living Under Muslim Laws (WLUML) member since 2006, when Salmmah was appointed as the focal point for Sudan.

Since 2020, Fahima has served as one of WLUML’s Council Members and is currently an active member of their publishing and fundraising committees. Finally, in 2022 she was selected as a research fellow at the Asfari Institute for Civil Society and Citizenship at the American University Beirut (AUB). This Fellowship is a platform to share her experience and an opportunity to research support to finalize her book on the history of the feminist movement in Sudan.

Fahima also published her first chapter in English, The Prism of Marginalization: Political Economy of Violence Against Women in Sudan and South Sudan (Zed Books, 2019).