Who is Linda Tsungirirai Masarira?

Linda Tsungirirai Masarira is a human rights defender, pro-democracy, socioeconomic and political activist who is passionate about women and girl child rights. She is also campaigning for the Harare central parliamentary seat in the 2018 elections as an independent candidate.

She is thirty-five years (35) old and currently studying for a Bachelor of Arts Honours in Peace and governance. She is a human rights defender passionate about equality, gender balance, women and girl child rights, democracy, inclusion and economic and political freedom for marginalized groups of society.

Linda is a widow and a proud mother of 5 children.

Following a series of demonstrations, petitions and protests for violations of human rights by the Government of Zimbabwe which she organised, she was incarcerated for more than 80 days in prison for challenging the ruling system to respect human dignity. During the days of incarceration, she mobilized fellow women prisoners and led an inmate protest against poor and inhumane conditions that women were being subjected to including lack of sanitary pads and access to medical services, because of that move, she was brutalized and moved to a male prison and placed on solitary confinement until she was granted bail by a High court order in September 2016.

She is the Founder and national coordinator for Zimbabwe Women in Politics Alliance, National Coordinator for the Young African Leadership Forum (Zimbabwean Chapter), Chairperson of the Revolutionary Freedom Fighters, Chairperson of STAR fellowship cohort 3, FES Alumni, Founder and Chairperson of the Association of Railways Terminated Employees and former President of the Trainmen workers Union (2008-2013).

Linda has also  been involved in trade unionism during her time at the National Railways of Zimbabwe and Systems Technology (Pvt) (Ltd) where she mobilized fellow employees to fight for their labour rights, which culminated into her getting fired from the two companies.
She organised several successful campaigns including  the “Bring back our women from Kuwait” campaign where she took a leading role in petitioning the government of Zimbabwe and the Kuwaiti Embassy to expedite the repatriation process to the stranded Zimbabwean women who had fallen victim to human trafficking. Following this campaign , the government of Zimbabwe later came up with an expatriation plan for all trafficked persons outside Zimbabwe which saw more than 200 women victims coming back home.

Besides political activism, humanitarian and democracy work, she is a former member of the executive management committee of the People`s Democratic Party (PDP) responsible for recruitment and mobilization.

To compliment her vision for sustainable development not only in Zimbabwe, but the whole of Africa, she is also a business woman who utilizes her skills to educate young aspiring women to venture into income generation projects so that they can be independent economically .To that effect she strongly believes in Youth Leadership and grooming  young people to effectively advocate and fight for social economic and political justice in our country.