Waceke Wachira is a Governance and Devolution expert and a Public Sector and Non-State Sector institutional specialist with more than twenty years’ experience in the management of governance programmes in both state and non- state sectors. She has a Master’s Degree in public policy from the Hubert H. Humphrey Institute of Public Affairs of the University of Minnesota. Waceke has an exceptional track record in leading governance assistance projects in Kenya. She has managed governance projects supporting the strengthening of government institutions for over 15 years at high levels of responsibility. These include the European Union Governance Programme as the Program Team Lead for the, 2 years as the Programme Quality Assurance Manager for the GJLOs programme, the USAID funded Parliamentary Support Project as Deputy Country Director and AHADI the USAID Devolution flagship project as the Country Director.
Waceke has extensive knowledge and experience in strengthening the civic space in Kenya. She coordinated the strengthening of the country’s Civil Society Sector through the Democratic Governance Program of the European Union by enhancing the CSOs institutional capacity to fulfil their mandates. She enabled the CSOs supported to provide awareness creation to their target communities which enhanced the communities’ participation in the governance processes at the local level. Waceke successfully coordinated the implementation of the Civic Education Programme of the Centre for Governance and Development (CGD) which played a key role in creating public awareness of the need for a new constitution.