Mosaic

Her Royal Highness Princess Badiya bint El Hassan

Mosaic Chairman

H.R.H. Princess Badiya bint El Hassan of Jordan has a BA Hons in History from Oxford University and an LL.M. in public international law from The London School of Economics. She was called to the Bar by Lincoln's Inn in 1998.   Her current work is focused on projects to further interfaith and cross cultural understanding, as well as initiatives to promote human rights in general and, more specifically, the rights of asylum seekers and refugees.  Princess Badiya also works with her father, Prince El Hassan, and the organisations he is associated with. She is regularly invited to give lectures, often to students, on Islam, human rights and related issues.  She is a Princes Trust Ambassador and, since its inception, she has also been an active supporter of Mosaic.  Princess Badiya chaired the first Mosaic Talent Awards in November 2008.

Aaqil Ahmed

Aaqil Ahmed is Head of Religion and Ethics and Commissioning Editor for TV and is part of the BBC Knowledge Commissioning team. Aaqil joined the BBC from Channel 4 where for more than six years he was Commissioning Editor for Religion and Head of Multicultural Programming. Commissions include many award-winning and high-profile projects such as Saving Africa's Witch Children, The Qur'an, Inside The Mind Of A Suicide Bomber, Christianity: A History and the religion strand Revelations.

From 2000 to 2003 Aaqil was employed by the BBC's Religion and Ethics department as Deputy Editor of Documentaries, where he worked on a number of projects from Trouble Up North, Headhunting The Homeless, Richard Gere On Buddhism to the acclaimed current affairs and religion strand Everyman. Previously Aaqil worked for the BBC as a Director on Here And Now. He also produced and directed The Crime Squad (fronted by Sue Lawley) as well as numerous one-off documentaries for BBC One such as Britain On The Fiddle and Behind The Bike Sheds.

In addition he produced news event specials such as the funeral of Diana Princess of Wales and the Turkish earthquake. Aaqil began his career at the BBC in 1992 working primarily for BBC Birmingham on programmes such as Panorama, Network East and Bollywood Or Bust.

In 2005 he was awarded The Ibn Batuta Excellence in Media award by The Muslim News and in 2007 Aaqil was presented with an achievement award in arts and media by the Asian Power Hundred. Aaqil is a trustee of the Runnymede Trust, chairman of the Mosaic Media Network as well as being a member of the Mosaic Advisory Board.

Shaykh Abu Bakr Ahmed as-Sudani

Shaykh Abu Bakr Ahmed as Sudani arrived in the UK from Sudan in the 1970s and is currently the Imam of Yusuf Islam's Islamia School. For many years the Shaykh has been actively helping the poor and needy in his native Sudan. In 2004 this work was expanded upon in an official capacity with the founding of Ulfa Aid - an international relief agency of which Shaykh Babikir is the Chairman. Ulfa Aid is focusing on assisting needy children around the world by constructing schools, medical centres and houses in areas such as Darfur and Aceh.

Mr Ismail Amla

Ismail Amla is a Partner in Financial Services at Accenture, a member of the UK/I leadership team and the Accenture lead for UK/I Human Capital and Diversity. Over the last 20 years, Ismail has led large-scale business and technology change programmes in diverse industries, held strategic and operational responsibility for large businesses in the UK and worked on a number of overseas projects. He also lectures as a visiting fellow at the Manchester Business School and is passionate about Bolton Wanderers FC! 

Mr Syed Muhammad Ali

CEO of Fortune Group, an asset management firm and Managing Director of Perfect Home Real Estate, a property marketing and consultancv firm.  Muhammad is also the Director of the Pakistan Business Council in the U.A.E. One of his grandest achievements to date is the Burj Al Alam - the tallest commercial tower which will stand at 108-storeys (501 meters).Syed was born in Pakistan but now resides with his family in Dubai.

Mr Mahmoud Atalla

Mahmoud Atalla is a Managing Director of HSBC Principal Investments and Head of HSBC Private Equity (UK) - the UK mid-market private equity investment business of the HSBC Group. Mahmoud joined the HSBC Group in 1998. He has worked with HSBC's investment banking and private equity investment businesses in London, Dubai and New York. He rejoined HSBC from Montagu Private Equity, where he focused on UK buyouts, and was a founding member of HSBC Private Equity Middle East. He has an MSc from the London School of Economics & Political Science (LSE) in Politics of the World Economy and a BSc from the University of Bristol in Economics and Politics.

Mahmoud is a board member of both the Amtech Group and the Britton Group. In June 2009 Mahmoud completed one of the largest buyouts in Europe to date - the acquisition of Viking Moorings - a market leading provider of services to the offshore oil and gas industry - and of which Mahmoud is now a board member.

Mahmoud is a Board Member of HRH Prince of Wales' Mosaic mentoring scheme and a member of HRH Prince of Wales' Mosaic Council, as well as a member of the Oxford Centre for Islamic Studies' Young Muslim Leadership Programme and HRH Mohammed Bin Rashid's Young Arab Leaders.

Mr Kameel Khan

Dr. Kameel Khan is a lawyer who now sits as a Judge in the Tax Court. He was born in Trinidad, West Indies of Asian parentage and attended both the University of London and McGill University, Canada where he obtained his Phd. Dr Khan has been a lecturer in Law at University College London and a Visiting Scholar at Harvard Law School.  Before working in Tax Law, Dr Khan worked on human rights cases for people on death row in the Caribbean. His first job was as a labourer on a farm in Trinidad.  Dr Khan is a good cricketer, likes jazz music and has two children, one a law student and the other studying Urban Planning at University College London. His wife is also a lawyer.

Mr Khawar Mann

Khawar Mann is a partner with Apax Partners, the international private equity firm, where he specialises in healthcare investments.  His recent investments include the hospital groups General Healthcare Group Ltd in the UK, Capio AB and Unilabs in Europe and Apollo Hospitals in India.  He has a degree in Medical Sciences and Law from Cambridge University and also an LLM Master of Law.  He has an MBA from The Wharton School, where he was a Fulbright and Thouron scholar.  Khawar began his career as a lawyer with Linklaters in London specialising in Corporate Finance and Intellectual Property.  He then moved to Weston Medical Group PLC as the Commercial Director before joining Apax Partners in 2003.  Khawar is a Trustee of The Enterprise Education Trust and the Apax Foundation and is also a member of the Government Taskforce for Talent and Enterprise.

Mr Malik Karim

Malik is a senior investment banker who specialises in providing strategic and corporate finance advice to the financial services sector. A former Director of Kleinwort Benson and Managing Director of Credit Suisse First Boston, Malik is a founder and Chairman of Fenchurch Advisory

Partners LLP the leading independent investment bank specialising in providing investment banking advice to major financial institutions in the UK. Fenchurch was voted runner up as Newcomer of the Year and as Independent Corporate Finance House by Acquisitions Monthly in 2004 and 2005 respectively. During his career, he has advised leading financial institutions and governments on over 40 financial services transactions worth $35 billion, making him one of the leading practitioners in the UK market. He is a prize winning graduate from the University of Manchester from where he has a B.A. and an M.A. in Economics. He qualified as a Chartered Accountant with Arthur Andersen. He is a member of Northwood Cricket Club, Sandy Lodge Golf Club and an active supporter of Anti Slavery International. Malik is married with two children.

Ms Nabila Sadiq

Nabila joined Joslin Rowe Temporaries as Director in 1997 to build one of the leading investment banking  recruitment agencies in London's financial centre. Nabila was made a Main Board Director of the Blomfield group in 1999 and was made Managing Director of Joslin Rowe Temporaries is 2002. Nabila's achievements were further recognized when she was awarded the title of Asian business women of the year in 2003. Nabila is currently taking a career break from the world of recruitment and pursuing other business and charitable interests.

Mr Peter Sanders

One of London's leading photographers of rock musicians in the 1960s, Peter's work has since focused on followers of Islam. His first book quickly sold out, and the second work The Art of Integration shows how Muslims have been an integral and important part of Britain for more than a century. 

Mr Tidjane Thiam

Tidjane Thiam has been an Executive Director of Prudential and Group Chief Financial Officer since March 2008. Tidjane was appointed CEO Designate on the 19th March 2009 and will become CEO on the 30th September 2009.  He was previously Chief Executive Officer, Europe at Aviva, where he also held successively the positions of Group Strategy and Development Director and Managing Director, Aviva International. Prior to that, Tidjane was a partner with McKinsey & Company in France and one of the leaders of their Financial Institutions practice, focusing on insurance companies and banks.  Earlier in his career, he spent a number of years in Africa where he was Chief Executive and then Chairman of the National Bureau for Technical Studies and Development in Cote d'Ivoire and a cabinet member as Minister of Planning and Development.  He is a non-executive director of Arkema in France, a member of the Council of the Overseas Development Institute (ODI) in London and a sponsor of Opportunity International, a charity focusing on microfinance in developing countries.

Mr Iqbal Wahhab

Iqbal Wahhab was educated in London and is a graduate of the London School of Economics. After working as a journalist in the national press for three years, in 1991 he set up his own PR firm that specialised in food, drink and restaurants and then in 1994 he launched Tandoori Magazine. He sold out of the magazine to launch the multi award winning Cinnamon Club in 2001 - a restaurant and bar aimed to change the way we view Indian dining. In 2003 he co-authored The Cinnamon Club Cookbook and in 2005 opened Roast, a restaurant and bar in Borough Market celebrating the best of British cooking with the best of seasonal British produce.

In 2007 he was awarded an Honorary Doctorate in Business Administration by the University of East London. He works closely with The Prince's Trust, taking children from under-privileged schools in south east London and spending half days with them at Roast and taking them on food education programmes around Borough Market. Iqbal is chair of the Government's Ethnic Minority Advisory Group to discuss ways to reduce ethnic minority unemployment levels and sits on a Task Force with eight minsters to formulate policies to this end. Iqbal has been appointed as Chair of Autograph ABP.

Ms Yasmin Waljee

Yasmin Waljee is a solicitor and full time Pro Bono Manager at international law firm Lovells.  Yasmin's appointment in 1997 was the first of its kind by a City law firm.  Since then she has worked with partners in the firm to develop an international pro bono programme providing free 15,000 hours of legal advice to over 200 charities and individuals a year unable to afford legal advice.  She is an immigration lawyer but now regularly works on human rights cases including compensation for the July 7 victims, Article 2 issues and compensation for British victims of crime and terrorism abroad. In May 2005 Yasmin was short listed for the Asian Women of Achievement Awards and in April 2000 Yasmin was awarded The Times Woman Solicitor of the Year.

STRATEGIC ADVISORS

Salma Abbasi

Salma Abbasi is the Chairperson and CEO of e Worldwide Group, a consortium of 37 international companies and universities. She is a member of UN-GAID and coauthor of the Child Online Protection (COP) initiative with the UN-ITU. She is also a Senior Associate Fellow in King's College London in the Conflict, Security and Development Group (CSDG). Salma has joined hands with UNESCO to drive the global ‘Power of Peace' (PPN) initiative to promote the concept of understanding, tolerance, respect and inter-faith harmony, through the mobilization of global youth ambassadors. 

Salma has also conducted extensive field research in Pakistan, focused at understanding the barriers and challenges that women face when engaging with ICTs in Muslim societies as part of her PhD.