About Hosh

Hosh Ibrahim is a British-born entrepreneurial leader and adviser of Sudanese and Egyptian heritage, working across Africa and internationally. He grew up between Khartoum, Birmingham and London, learning early how to read rooms he had not grown up in: to notice their unwritten rules, their silences, their hierarchies and the distance between what people say and what they do. That instinct has stayed with him throughout his career.

Photography: James Fickling

Background

Based in London, Hosh now works internationally across governance, philanthropy, health, childhood development and human rights. Earlier in his career, he worked in television, film and production under the name Hosh Kane, before founding Planet Developments. In Sudan, he worked alongside his mother, Dr Hania Fadl OBE, to help establish the Khartoum Breast Care Centre, where he remains a trustee.

Hosh serves on the Council of the Mo Ibrahim Foundation, founded by his father Sir Mo Ibrahim, and chairs its Now Generation Network. He is also a board member of Synergos, Outright International and the Fund for Global Human Rights, and a member of Sesame Workshop’s Global Advisory Board.

Reading a room this way lets him see where the connections and shared objectives lie, where assumptions have been overlooked, and where fears can be named and answered with experience and safeguards, so that a different way forward can emerge.

A river boat carrying passengers on the Nile at Tuti Island, Khartoum

Tower Bridge over the Thames in London, with a boat passing beneath

A canal lined with old red-brick buildings in Birmingham on a summer day

Clockwise from top:Khartoum, the Nile at Tuti Island (Photo by Musnany (opens in a new tab) on Unsplash (opens in a new tab)); London, Tower Bridge (Photo by Pietro De Grandi (opens in a new tab) on Unsplash (opens in a new tab)); Birmingham, the canals (Photo by Bas van der Horst (opens in a new tab) on Unsplash (opens in a new tab)).

About Hosh

The Journey

Understanding Diverse Perspectives

The habit is an old one. Long before any boardroom, it meant working out the unwritten rules of wherever he had just landed. Today, when he first encounters an institution, that instinct becomes three questions: Which assumptions have gone untested? Whose perspective is missing? What does the institution say about itself that its behaviour does not yet support?

Hosh Ibrahim with Dr Salim Ahmed Salim and a musician at State House, Tanzania, for the 2011 launch of the Ibrahim Index of African Governance

Performance & Production

What stayed with him was not the performance work itself, but the discipline behind production: different people, competing demands, finite resources and a fixed outcome all having to move in the same direction.

Sequencing, ownership, timing and follow-through remain central to the way he approaches institutional work.

None of us can achieve unless all of us achieve.

Hosh with colleagues beside a film camera and clapperboard, during his years in television, film and production

Hosh looking up at a building under construction

On the set of The Black Lion, Vienna, 2010, during his years in television, film and production. Inset: Hosh working on site.

Hosh Kane Photography: Alisa Connan

Behind the Camera Photographed by Hosh on his travels across Africa

Institution-Building in Sudan

Helping to establish the Khartoum Breast Care Centre gave Hosh direct experience of what it takes to turn an urgent need into a functioning institution, and to build the systems, structures and ways of working needed to sustain it in a complex and often unstable operating environment.

The experience left him with a question he still brings to organisations today: what will it take for this good intention to become something people can actually use?

Exterior of the Khartoum Breast Care Centre in Khartoum, with its sign above the entrance

Khartoum Breast Care Centre, Khartoum.

Founded in October 2010, the Centre was the first specialised and multidisciplinary breast cancer centre in Sudan: a non-profit, privately funded hospital providing breast cancer care in Khartoum. Its operations are currently paused because of the conflict in Sudan.

Governance and a New Generation

Hosh joined the Mo Ibrahim Foundation Council after several years as the Foundation’s Director of Special Projects.

As Chair of the Now Generation Network, he brings younger African perspectives into conversations on governance, leadership and the continent’s future.

Hosh Ibrahim with his father, Dr Mo Ibrahim, pointing across the room at the 2025 Ibrahim Governance Weekend in Marrakech — With Mo Ibrahim at the 2025 Ibrahim Governance Weekend, Marrakech.

Philanthropy, Rights and Childhood

Hosh’s philanthropy work sits at the intersection of people, capital and institutions.

He is a board member of Synergos, Outright International and the Fund for Global Human Rights, and a member of Sesame Workshop’s Global Advisory Board.

Hosh Ibrahim addressing a Synergos gathering — Addressing a Synergos gathering, New York, 2026. Photo: Synergos.

Health and Humanity

In 2026, Africa CDC invited him to join the African High-Level Ministerial Committee on Global Health Architecture Reform.

That year he was also named the inaugural recipient of the Hosh Ibrahim Humanitarian Award, presented by Global Black Pride in Paris.

The crystal Hosh Ibrahim Humanitarian Award — The Hosh Ibrahim Humanitarian Award, presented by Global Black Pride in Paris on 11 September 2026.

Working Internationally from London

From London, he works across Africa and internationally on governance, philanthropy, health, childhood development and human rights.

Hosh speaking and gesturing with both hands during an Alliance panel discussion — On the panel at Alliance magazine’s 30th anniversary debate, London, 2026. Photo: Alliance.

Hosh in Action

Bring the perspectives, generations and forms of knowledge missing from a decision into the same room. Institutional leaders alongside younger practitioners, funders alongside community voices, so decision-makers can see what they might otherwise miss.

With Sophie Matsipa, Rajiv Joshi and Charlotte Ashamu at the Ibrahim Governance Weekend
A dinner in London in support of Brand63Africa, September 2026
At a Synergos gathering, Stone Barns Center for Food & Agriculture, New York, 2025 · Photo: Synergos
With Outright International board members at their annual meeting, London
With activists and supporters at the High Court in Nairobi, Kenya, 2018
Reviewing the press release for the Ibrahim Index launch with Sophie Matsipa and Foundation colleagues, 2014
With Dr Hania Fadl and a musician at State House, Tanzania, for the 2011 launch of the Ibrahim Index of African Governance
Around a table with fellow guests
With Mo Ibrahim and Hadeel Ibrahim at Mo Ibrahim’s 70th birthday dinner, Dubai, 2016
With Mary Robinson at the 2015 Ibrahim Governance Weekend, Accra
With Hadeel Ibrahim at the 2015 Ibrahim Governance Weekend, Accra
In the audience at the 2015 Ibrahim Governance Weekend, Accra
With Mary Robinson and guests at the 2015 Ibrahim Governance Weekend, Accra
With Mary Robinson and Graça Machel at a Mo Ibrahim Foundation board meeting
With Mo Ibrahim at the 2025 Ibrahim Governance Weekend, Marrakech
Black Excellence Gala & Awards, Paris · 2026
With the Mo Ibrahim Foundation board and guests at a board meeting
In conversation with Foundation staff at the 2022 Ibrahim Forum reception, London
With King Charles III at Buckingham Palace, 2025 · Courtesy of Buckingham Palace

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