Mbali Hlongwane

2024-2025 Obama Foundation Africa Leader

Headshot of Mbali Hlongwane, 2024 Obama Foundation Africa Leader

Founder, Pink Codrs Africa

South Africa

Mbali Hlongwane is the founder of Pink Codrs Africa, an organization with a mission to empower one million African women with in-demand tech skills by 2030. Mbali is driven by her personal experiences as a systems engineer. Under her leadership, over the past five years Pink Codrs Africa has successfully helped more than 2,000 women and provided training to over 700 aspiring coders. Mbali plans to extend Pink Codrs into at least three other African countries this year. In addition to her role with Pink Codrs, Mbali serves as the Tech Lead at Womhub, contributing to the advancement of women in technology. Mbali’s approach to building a formidable tech skills acquisition hub for women has provided a strong pathway towards livelihood development and a clear employment pipeline in South Africa.

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