Presenter Biographies     (Register for the conference here.)

Johsa Manzanilla, AI Canada Board of Directors

Johsa Manzanilla is a proud member of Group 19 in Winnipeg. She attended the Human Rights College in Montreal during AI’s 50th anniversary year and shortly after became AI Canada’s Philippines Country Coordinator. She was elected to the Board as a Director at the 2013 AGM. Born on the islands of the Philippines and raised in the desert of Saudi Arabia, she is the daughter of overseas Filipino workers who eventually immigrated to the prairies of Manitoba. She considers herself an anti-imperialist, and devotes much of her activist efforts campaigning for the rights of migrants and immigrants, as well as issues that affect true freedom from poverty, corruption, and systemic oppressions on women’s rights, access to health and education, sexual expression, and the right to livelihood and safe and fair working conditions.
She received her undergraduate degree from Queen’s University and went on to complete a Master’s specializing in Human Rights, Social Justice and Development from the International Institute of Social Studies at The Hague, The Netherlands.

Johsa is currently employed as a Researcher and Program Analyst with Employment Solutions for Immigrants Inc., licensed to deliver the Manitoba Start Program, which seeks to help and guide newcomers seeking to enter the labour market through employability skills workshops, career coaching and settlement support.

Partnering with national academics, as well as in working with both local and international groups like Migrante International, the Migrant Workers Solidarity Network, Gabriela, ANAK (Aksyon Ng Ating Kabattan), LEAF and the national young feminist movement’s Rebelles collective, Johsa has developed strong skills in grassroots, member-based capacity building, strategic organizing and consensus-based decision making.

Jackie Hansen, Major Campaigns and Women’s Rights Campaigner, Amnesty International Canada

With over 15 years of advocacy, research, and management experience in the field of human rights and international disarmament, Jackie Hansen is the campaigner covering major campaigns including Stop Torture, as well as gender rights, for Amnesty International Canada (English) at the National Office in Ottawa, ON.

Jackie joined Amnesty in February 2013. She previously worked with the International Campaign to Ban Landmines and the Cluster Munition Coalition. This included eight years as the Program Manager of Landmine and Cluster Munition Monitor, a program renowned for providing independent and impartial reporting on developments and challenges in eliminating victim-activated weapons.

Having lived and travelled extensively overseas, Jacqueline finds tranquility in spending time with her family and raising dairy goats on her small homestead in Quebec’s Gatineau Hills. She has a degree in Anthropology and Political Science from the University of Victoria.

Lily Mah-Sen, a trained popular educator, facilitator, and social activist has been involved in social justice work for the past 40 years (yes! she’s THAT OLD!) Her area of expertise is in using popular education methodology to empower people to social action.   In her many wonderings around the world, she’s used popular education techniques working with village elders in Papua New Guinea, sustainable agriculturalists and environmentalists in northern Thailand, development aid workers in Botswana, social analysts in Zimbabwe, and social activists in the Canadian Prairies. Lily has taught high school and worked on curriculum development in Papua New Guinea; taught English as a Second Language in a workplace program with immigrant women in Edmonton; and worked with the Edmonton Native Brotherhood on an inner city experimental film project.  Her theatre experience includes working with playwrights on developing social drama and helping to organize the Canadian Theatre Festival in Edmonton.

In her spare time, Lily “moonlights” as an outside facilitator helping non-profit organizations renew, restructure, and deal with organizational change. In this capacity, she has facilitated meetings organized by Oxfam Canada; the Agha Khan Foundation; the Canadian Council for International Cooperation; the Social Action Committees in Lethbridge, Medicine Hat, Calgary; the Union of Child Care Workers of Eastern Ontario, CUPE 2204; the Laotian and Cambodian community of Ottawa, as well as guest lectured on culture and mediation to first year law students at Ottawa University and to international development students at Carleton University.

In Amnesty, Lily is part of the Member Activism Team, with responsibility for providing support to community groups, action circles, and fieldworkers.   She is also the staff person supporting membership meetings (regional meetings and the AGM) and membership consultations.  Within Amnesty International, Lily has facilitated workshops on Diversity and Amnesty for the Amnesty Chairs Forum in Portugal (June 2006), Co-organized and facilitated sessions at the Amnesty’s Inter-Sectional Meeting on Grassroots Activism in France(2005) and Motivating Change for Amnesty and Oxfam volunteers in Quebec (2004).

Lily has a Masters of Management for the Non-Profit Sector degree from McGill University,  is the author of two books on popular education and has designed three simulation games on the topics of Indigenous land rights, diversity, and power structures in the North and South.

Her biggest challenge, so far, has been trying to train Sylvester, her cat, who refuses to be facilitated, no matter what technique she chooses.

 Darlene R. Okemaysim-Sicotte 

                                        Darlene R. Okemaysim-Sicotte, is a Cree from Beardy’s & Okemasis First Nation near the town of Duck Lake, Saskatchewan, and was educated at Rivier Academy in Prince Albert and the University of Saskatchewan.  She is an extremely hardworking in any work place but her devotion is to family and dedicates that other part of her life with showing much love and support. Darlene’s past experiences in the workplace include Executive Assistant at Saskatchewan Indian Institute of Technologies, Departmental Secretary at U of S Native Studies, and One Earth Farms FN LP.  Darlene is also a 7 year member of the local concerned citizens group Iskwewuk Ewichiwitochik (Women Walking Together) whose focus is on missing and murdered indigenous women.  Darlene received the Queen Elizabeth II Diamond Jubilee Medal in January 2013 for this volunteerism.  She currently lives in Saskatoon with her husband Chris Sicotte and mother to Christopher, Cory, Aren and Sunflower all of whom enjoy the local and provincial arts scene.