Our Leadership

Meet the people who lead DignitySA, run its operations, and advise its board.

Operations

Operations Manager

Day-to-day management and running of the organisation, supporting the board and the programmes.

Operations Manager

Leigh Meinert

Leigh Meinert is DignitySA’s Operations Manager and former Advocacy and Operations Manager at the Association of Palliative Care Centres. After 20 years in the education sector, she retrained as a death doula and was the first Chairperson of the Soul Carers Network, supporting compassionate accompaniment for people and families at the end of life. Her work focuses on widening access to quality palliative care, public education and honest conversations about death, dying and grief. She has written and spoken publicly on palliative care, advance directives and assisted dying, and brings to DignitySA a practical commitment to care, choice and dignity for all South Africans.

Board of Directors

Our Executive Directors

The Executive Directors share responsibility for DignitySA’s strategic direction, finances and programmes.

Chair and Co-founder

Willem Landman

Prof Willem Landman holds degrees in philosophy, political philosophy, theology and law from the Universities of Stellenbosch, Oxford (Rhodes Scholarship) and Unisa. He has chaired Philosophy departments at Walter Sisulu University (1977–1982) and the University of the Western Cape (1983–1994), held a chair in Medical Humanities at the Brody School of Medicine, University of North Carolina (1994–2000), and served as Professor Extraordinaire in Philosophy at Stellenbosch University (2000–2024). He is the founding CEO of the Ethics Institute of South Africa, co-editor of The Bioethics Reader: Editors’ Choice (2007), and co-founder of the international journal Developing World Bioethics. He serves as Ethics Advisor to the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria, as Chair of the PwC Ethics Board for Africa and the Middle East, and as a board member of the Institute of Directors.

Executive Director

Joseph Raimondo

Associate Professor Joseph Raimondo is Head of the Division of Cell Biology at the University of Cape Town. He holds a medical degree from UCT and a DPhil in Neuroscience from the University of Oxford, which he completed as a Rhodes Scholar. He brings the perspective of a medically-trained neuroscientist to the board’s work on end-of-life law and clinical practice in South Africa.

Executive Director

Sanja Bornman

Sanja Bornman is a senior attorney and gender law and policy specialist who consults to both the private and public-interest law sectors. Her work covers legal advocacy, policy and law reform, and strategic litigation, with a focus on gender-based violence and discrimination, children’s rights, and socio-economic rights. She serves as Vice President of the South African Federation for Mental Health.

Executive Director

Lynne Grubb

Lynne Grubb has worked on the right-to-die campaign for many years. Her life partner, Dieter Harck, is at the centre of the law-change campaign in South Africa, and Lynne supports his application for a legal assisted death through the courts. She has considerable experience with the issues around dying, having lost both her parents and her first husband to difficult deaths. She has been a caregiver for hospice and is a qualified death doula.

Executive Director

Vuya Kabanyane Ilengou

Vuya Kabanyane Ilengou is a brand and marketing leader with over 20 years of experience across South Africa, East and West Africa, and Europe. She has held senior management roles at Liberty, Old Mutual and Telkom, building expertise in brand management, communications and stakeholder engagement. After qualifying as a death doula, she shifted her focus towards human advocacy, with a particular interest in opening conversations about end of life across cultures. At DignitySA she leads on Brand and Communications Strategy and is a spokesperson for the organisation.

Advisory Trustees

Counsel from civil society

The civil society leaders who advise the board and bring experience from law, public health, religion and the non-profit sector.

Advisory Trustee, Co-founder

Sean Davison

Sean Davison is a co-founder of DignitySA and of the Innocence Project, an organisation that sought to exonerate wrongfully imprisoned people through DNA testing that had not been carried out at the time of their trial. After his arrest and High Court trial in South Africa, he became an international campaigner for legal reform on assisted dying under defined criteria, and served for five years as President of the World Federation of Right-to-Die Societies. Formerly a Professor of Biotechnology at the University of the Western Cape, he now lives in the UK with his family. He is the author of three books: Before We Say Goodbye, The Last Waltz: Love, Death and Betrayal, and The Price of Mercy: A Fight for the Right To Die With Dignity.

Advisory Trustee

Mark Heywood

Mark Heywood has over three decades of experience in South African civil society. He founded or co-founded several of the country’s most respected civil society organisations, including the Treatment Action Campaign, Corruption Watch, SECTION27, the AIDS and Rights Alliance of Southern Africa (ARASA) and, in 2019, Maverick Citizen, a section of the Daily Maverick focused on activism and social justice. He still sits on the boards of several of these organisations and currently works as an independent social justice organiser, writer, researcher and freelance journalist.

Advisory Trustee

Janet Jobson

Janet Jobson is the CEO of the Desmond and Leah Tutu Legacy Foundation, where she leads the Foundation’s work on societal healing for peace and transformation. She joined the Foundation from a career in activism and in the development sector, both locally and globally, and was previously Deputy CEO at the DG Murray Trust (DGMT). She has held governance and operational roles with Activate! Leadership, Amandla.mobi, Life Choices, Amnesty International South Africa, CIVICUS, and the South African Girl Child Alliance.

Advisory Trustee

Rev. Mogomotsi Diutlwileng

Rev. Mogomotsi Diutlwileng is an ordained minister of the Methodist Church of Southern Africa, a social entrepreneur, and an author. He has founded and contributes to numerous non-profit community development organisations that address education, housing and conflict resolution. Trained in theology at the University of South Africa, Rev. Diutlwileng is also a qualified teacher and accredited facilitator. His work combines education, faith, and innovation, with a particular interest in futuristic leadership and holistic development. He is widely sought as a retreat facilitator and spiritual teacher and leads a growing ecumenical online Bible Study ministry.

How we account for the work

Read the story of DignitySA’s work over the last fifteen years, and the published reports that describe what we have done with the resources entrusted to us.

Our Journey Our Reports Home

Support the work

Stand with the board and the cause

The legal challenge, the public engagement and the advance directives work depend on public support.

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