Our Team
With diverse and rich backgrounds in the fields of media and journalism, international development, political economy, academia, diplomacy, and corporate communication, we are professionals experienced in engaging with stakeholders from every walk of life, including policymakers and holders of highest public offices.
Shahzeb Jillani
Jillani is a multimedia journalist, broadcaster and editor who has worked with the world’s leading media outlets in senior editorial and managerial roles producing compelling, high quality, original content for digital, TV and radio.
Currently working as an independent journalist based out of Karachi, Shahzeb was previously associated with DW News as a Senior Editor in Germany, and as a Senior Executive Editor at Dunya News in Karachi. Shahzeb has extensive experience in covering elections, natural disasters, militancy and interviewing news makers during his 15 years as a BBC correspondent reporting from the US, Israel, Saudi Arabia, Lebanon, Afghanistan, Brazil, Venezuela, Cuba and the Guantanamo Bay. He has also served as a Team Leader of BBC Urdu Services.
Shahzeb has a BSc (International Affairs) from Lewis and Clark College in the US.
Lubna Jerar Naqvi
Naqvi is a journalist, fact-checker, social media safety and security, and gender equity and safety trainer (IFJ).
She is currently the IFJ's Pakistan Gender Coordinator and Trainer, the social media and gender safety trainer for the International Federation of Journalists (IFJ), and an IFJ Council Member for Gender 2022-2025.
Lubna serves as the Vice President of the Karachi Union of Journalists (KUJ) and is a member of the Pakistan Federal Union for Journalists (PFUJ). She was also a researcher for the 2014-15 UNESCO-IFJ Gender Report Asia-Pacific: Media through a Gender Lens.
Lubna is also the first woman from Pakistan to win the South Asia Laadli Media & Advertising Award for Gender Sensitivity in 2015 for her work in the media industry.
She has attended the Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism at Oxford University, the Centre for Excellence in Journalism (CEJ), the East-West Center Reporting on Cross-Border, and MOOCs (massive open online courses) at the University of Texas' Knight Center for Journalism in the Americas.
Shahzad Sharjeel
Sharjeel is a communication professional with over 25 years of experience in development and strategic communications. His special interests and competence include political economy analysis, media, and client relationship management, internal communication, and editing.
He has extensive experience working with international development organizations and collaborating with various levels of government and stakeholders to achieve institutional goals like consensus building for policy formulation, reputation enhancement and management, and employing communication to achieve operational goals.
He is a visiting faculty at the Centre for Excellence in Journalism at the Institute of Business Administration, Karachi; Quaid-i-Azam University; and Shaheed Zulfikar Ali Bhutto Institute of Science & Technology, Islamabad.
He is also a regular contributor to the editorial pages of daily Dawn, the largest English-language newspaper in Pakistan. Sharjeel has authored two books — an anthology of Urdu poetry "Kiyun" which was published in 2008 and a collection of satirical essays called "Rindana" which came out in 2022.
Kamal Siddiqi
Siddiqi has over twenty-six years of experience in journalism. He helped the Institute of Business Administration, Karachi in setting up the Center for Excellence in Journalism and served as its launching Director. From 2009 to 2016, he was the Editor of The Express Tribune, an English language daily in Pakistan affiliated to the International New York Times. In this position, he oversaw three print and one digital edition.
He has also worked with The News as Editor Reporting, with daily Dawn as a leader writer and as member of the paper’s editorial board and with several international publications and media outlets including the Economist Intelligence Unit and Dow Jones News Wires.
He is a fellow of the Center for Democratic Development and Rule of Law (CDDRL) at Stanford University. He is also a senior non-resident fellow with the Atlantic Council.
He holds an MSc Economics with specialization in Media and Communication Studies from the London School of Economics.
