Empower People 20th Foundation Day: Celebrating 20 Years of Impact

On December 18, 2006, Empower People was founded with a clear purpose—to confront bride trafficking and stand with women whose lives had been shaped by exploitation and exclusion. As we mark our 20th Foundation Day, we reflect on two decades of learning, resistance, and survivor-led action.

Over the past twenty years, Empower People has grown into an organisation rooted in the belief that sustainable change must be led by those with lived experience. Survivors are not positioned at the margins of our work; they are at its centre—as community leaders, advocates, trainers, and decision-makers shaping programmes and priorities.

Our journey has moved beyond intervention alone to building long-term pathways for dignity, identity, and leadership. Through survivor collectives, community engagement, and rights-based initiatives, women have reclaimed agency—accessing welfare, asserting legal recognition, and challenging the social norms that enable trafficking under the guise of marriage.

This Foundation Day is both a moment of reflection and a reaffirmation. While progress has been made, bride trafficking continues to exist in hidden and normalized forms. Ending it requires sustained effort, collective accountability, and survivor voices leading solutions at every level.

To commemorate our 20th year, members of our community, shared photographs and moments that reflect strength, solidarity, and shared ownership of this movement—reminders that this work is built on people, trust, and collective courage.

As we step into the years ahead, we recommit ourselves to survivor leadership, community-driven change, and a future where every woman lives with dignity, choice, and freedom from exploitation.

Thank you for being part of our journey.Here’s to 20 years since our foundation—and to the work that continues.