Jumaina Siddiqui is a program officer for South Asia at the U.S. Institute of Peace. She joined USIP after three years with the National Democratic Institute (NDI) where she served as the program manager for Pakistan, working on programs focusing on political party development, election observation and reforms and increasing the participation of women and youth in the political process. Jumaina was also a US-Pakistan program fellow with the South Asia Center at the Atlantic Council where her research focused on efforts by political actors on education reform in Pakistan and the relationship between donors, civil society, politicians and the government to move these reforms forward. Prior to joining NDI, she worked at Global Communities on a US Agency for International Development-funded project to increase stability in the Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA) of Pakistan by providing improved livelihood and economic growth opportunities.
Jumaina holds over 12 years of experience in program management, research and analysis. Other key positions included serving as a program officer at American Bar Association’s Rule of Law Initiative focusing on programs in Bangladesh, the Philippines and Thailand, as well as thematic programs related to media legal defense and access to justice in Asia; a research associate at the Stimson Center where she examined non-traditional security issues in South Asia; and program coordinator of the Protection Project at Johns Hopkins University – SAIS, conducting research on international human trafficking and managing a training program on human trafficking in the United States. She holds BA in Political Science from American University and an MA from New York University, where her work focused on democracy promotion and the rule of law in the Muslim world, culminating in a thesis on rebuilding justice systems in post-conflict Afghanistan.