Sightsavers’ board of trustees

Sir Clive Jones (Chair)

Sir Clive has been at the heart of the British broadcasting industry for most of his working life, during which he has held many senior posts at ITV, including managing director of the commercial network. He was also chief executive of two of its most successful companies, Central and Carlton.

He trained as a journalist with the Yorkshire Post after graduating from London School of Economics. An experienced chair, he now splits his time between the public and private sector, which has involved chairing the Disasters Emergencies Committee, National Theatre Wales and the Runnymede Trust.

Currently, he is chairman of both ITV pension funds and trustee of the Thomson Foundation, which seeks to underpin ethical journalism in the developing world and newly established democracies in Eastern Europe. Sir Clive has chaired Sightsavers’ UK board since July 2019.

Margaret Gyapong (Vice-chair)

A medical anthropologist by training, Professor Gyapong is director of the Institute of Health Research and coordinator of the Centre for Health Policy and Implementation Research at the University of Health and Allied Sciences in Ghana. Before joining the university in 2017, she spent almost 25 years as a researcher in the Ghana Health Service and was foundation director of the Dodowa Health Research Centre from 2005 to 2016.

Bill Kendall (Honorary treasurer)

Bill was appointed honorary treasurer of Sightsavers’ board of trustees in 2016. He is an international investment banker, with nearly 30 years of corporate finance experience at Morgan Grenfell, Lehman Brothers and Vollman Brothers, which he founded in 2002 and where he is currently the managing director.

A chartered accountant, Bill qualified with Price Waterhouse. He chairs the Sightsavers investment committee and is a member of the audit, governance and remuneration committees. He is also a board member of Sightsavers in the USA.

Abia Akram

With a personal experience of physical disability, Abia has been involved in the disability movement since 1997 and aims to give a voice to women with disabilities. She has lobbied parliamentarians and the UN to develop advocacy strategies and raise awareness, and she coordinates efforts to include people with disabilities in the implementation of the 2030 Agenda and its Sustainable Development Goals.

Joan Burton

Joan is a former Tánaiste of Ireland. She held that position in the coalition government from 2014-16, during which time she was also leader of the Labour Party. Previously, she was Minister for Social Protection, Minister of State for Overseas Development and Minister of State at the Department of Justice. A chartered accountant by profession, Joan worked in Tanzania in the 1980s as a lecturer at Dar es Salaam University. She also lectured at the Dublin Institute of Technology before entering politics.

Joy Hutcheon

Joy joined Sightsavers as a trustee in July 2019. She is a trustee of the Education Development Trust. Previously she served as a non-executive of FCDO Services and spent 15 years at the UK’s Department for International Development (DFID), most recently as director-general for finance and corporate performance, overseeing human resources, commercial and business support.

Elaine Lee

Elaine is an adviser at direct marketing trade association, DMA, and co-chairs its Vulnerable Taskforce. She is a Telephone Preference Service board member and a member of the Institute of Fundraising. In 2005, she co-founded marketing consultancy firm, ReynoldsBusbyLee, which works with commercial and charity clients to improve customer experience.

Dr Henry Nkumbe

Dr Henry Nkumbe is CEO of the Magrabi ICO Cameroon Eye Institute in Yaoundé, Cameroon, where he works as an ophthalmologist and vitreo-retinal surgeon. He has had an extensive academic and clinical career for the last 25 years. This included two appointments with the World Health Organization, serving as a fellow in vitreo-retinal surgery at Aravind Eye Hospital in Tamil Nadu, India, as well as appointments in several African countries with international non-governmental organisations involved in blindness prevention.

Mavis Owusu-Gyamfi

Ms Owusu-Gyamfi is a political economist with expertise in investment and extensive experience in international development, both with governments and non-governmental organisations. She served as Director of Investment with the UK-based foundation The Power of Nutrition until mid-June 2020 but will be joining the African Centre for Economic Transformation in Accra shortly as Executive Vice President.

Pratik Patel

Pratik is a pharmacist by training and has 20 years’ experience in research and development. He is currently the global head of programme management for Novartis, where his team oversees the programme management of Novartis’ late-stage development programmes. Prior to this role, Pratik held a number of roles in research and development at Roche.

Tuwani Rasengane

Tuwani is head of optometry at the University of the Free State in South Africa, and a senior manager of optometric services in the Free State. She represents Africa in the World Council of Optometry education committee. She has a PhD in physiological optics from the University of Houston, and has worked extensively in optometry and vision science.

Dr Garimella Subramaniam

Garimella is a professional journalist and holds a doctorate from the London School of Economics. He previously worked for The Hindu, an English daily newspaper in India, where he was the deputy editor. Until 2020, Garimella served on the board of trustees for the National Centre for Promotion of Employment for Disabled People, which advocates on cross-disability issues in India. He is currently the director of strategic initiatives at AgnoShin Technologies in Chennai, India. Before joining the global board, he was a trustee on the Sightsavers India board from 2013-2023.

Louis Taylor

Louis is chief executive of the British Business Bank, the UK’s national economic development bank. He previously held senior roles in financial services (UK Export Finance, JP Morgan and Standard Chartered), as well as in industry (BTR and Cookson). He has worked extensively in developing markets, and lived in Vietnam for three years. He is a former chair of trustees of Music in Prisons, and chair of governors at RGS Newcastle.

Sir Chris Whitty

Sir Chris is the Chief Medical Officer for England, Chief Medical Adviser to the UK government, Chief Scientific Adviser (CSA) at the Department of Health and Social Care and head of the National Institute for Health Research (NIHR). An epidemiologist and physician, he was previously professor of public and international health at the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine and is an expert in international public health.