The ATAF Women in Tax Network (AWITN) was established to develop and connect women across Africa working in taxation, to advance dialogue on the effect of tax policy on gender equality and to empower women to lead within the institutions that shape Africa’s tax future. Anchored in a new strategic direction centred on the institutionalisation of gender equality and lasting culture change, AWITN’s 2025–2026 Leadership Development Programme is a flagship project that directly supports the development of women in leadership.
The programme has achieved three cohorts representing thirty-one (31) African countries, strengthening the leadership capacity of over eighty (80) women drawn from government tax administrations, the private sector, tax practitioners’ institutes, civil society, and academia. Structured around the theme “Leading Self. Leading Others. Leading Teams for Operational Excellence,” it was designed as a progressive leadership journey beginning with self-awareness and building outward to influence team leadership and operational excellence at institutional level. Cohorts were sequenced deliberately for middle managers in November 2025, senior executives in March 2026, and junior managers in May 2026 signalling that AWITN invests in women at every stage of the pipeline, not only those who have already arrived.
Many women in Africa’s tax systems already possess the technical competence required for advancement. Yet confidence gaps, limited visibility and inadequate access to networks and sponsorship continue to constrain their progress particularly where implicit biases remain embedded in institutional culture. The programme addresses these barriers directly, equipping participants with practical tools in communication, emotional intelligence, influencing with authority and team leadership. In hierarchical and technically demanding organisations, these capabilities build institutional coalitions operationally critical as technical expertise.
AWITN’s mandate also calls for examining the role of women in tax systems within the broader context of tax and gender. According to the African Tax Outlook 2024, women account for only 27% of senior leadership in African tax administrations. This is not merely a diversity concern; it has substantive consequences for how tax policy is designed and how the tax system engages with the communities it serves. By developing women who can lead at the highest levels of influence and responsibility, the programme contributes directly to a more gender-responsive tax ecosystem.
AWITN’s new strategy demands more than training cycles. It demands institutionalisation; the embedding of gender-equitable leadership into the culture and structures of African tax organisations. The networks formed across this leadership development programme, the mentoring relationships cultivated and the action plans developed by participants are the building blocks of that change. Culture does not shift through isolated interventions; it shifts through a critical mass of prepared, connected, and confident women who carry the agenda forward within their institutions.
The pipeline being built through this programme is intentional and cumulative: one cohort, one conversation, and one mentoring moment at a time. The goal has never been to fill a quota. It has been to develop women so effectively that their readiness becomes visible, their contribution becomes undeniable and not selecting them becomes the harder decision to justify.
