Omezzine Khelifa is a Tunisian politician, activist, and social entrepreneur committed to youth inclusion, gender equality, and democratic governance. Born on July 7, 1982, in Carthage and raised in La Marsa, she studied telecommunications and computer science engineering in France, later working in finance and fintech for Société Générale Investment Banking.
In 2011, Khelifa returned to Tunisia following the revolution, joining the Ettakatol political party. She became a political bureau member and served as an adviser to the Ministers of Tourism and Finance during Tunisia’s post-revolution transitional governments. She later worked as a finance consultant for the World Bank, coordinating a multi-donor trust fund to support Tunisia’s financial governance reforms.
Khelifa co-founded the women’s branch of Ettakatol and helped establish Tha’era, an Arab women’s network for parity and solidarity. A strong advocate for women’s leadership, she joined the Women’s Alliance for Security Leadership in 2015. Her global recognitions include being named a Young Global Leader by the World Economic Forum in 2014, an Aspen New Voices Fellow in 2017, and a Leaders for Democracy awardee from the Project on Middle East Democracy in 2012. She was also an inaugural Obama Foundation Scholar at Columbia University in 2018.
In 2016, she founded Mobdiun – Creative Youth, a civic innovation organization that promotes youth inclusion and counters violent extremism through arts, sports, culture, and technology in underprivileged communities. Khelifa frequently publishes her political and social perspectives, contributing to the World Economic Forum, Open Democracy, and the Wilson Center.
