Our Board
Mohamed Shaheen
Board Chair and Artistic Director
Mohamed Shaheen | Board Chair and Artistic Director
Mohamed Shaheen completed his Bachelor’s degree at Dalhousie University, Halifax, before moving to Montreal to complete his Masters and Ph.D. degrees in Electrical Engineering at McGill University. His doctoral research focused on low-power electronics for mobile and biomedical devices.
Mohamed has been involved over the past decade in several community organizations, where his focus has been on civic engagement, advocacy, cross-cultural exchange, and civil liberties. In 2013, he founded the Silk Road Institute and served as the organization’s Founding Executive Director. He now serves as the organization’s Chair of the Board of Directors. Additionally, he continues to advise several Montreal-based organizations.
Mohamed is a Fellow of the Ariane de Rothschild Fellowship in Social Entrepreneurship at the University of Cambridge Judge Business School. His writings have appeared in the Globe and Mail and the Montreal Gazette, and he has been featured on CBC Radio One. He is also an avid photographer.
Haniya Sheikh
Board Vice-Chair
Haniya Sheikh | Board Vice-Chair
Haniya is a litigation lawyer at the Department of Justice with over 17 years of practice in multidisciplinary areas of the law, including dealing with high profile matters involving judicial reviews, civil and Charter issues. She is currently the Ward 12 Representative for the Parent Involvement Advisory Committee to the Toronto District School Board (TDSB).
Yasin Dwyer
Board Member
Yasin Dwyer | Board Member
Yasin Dwyer joined the Silk Road Institute in the summer of 2015. He was born in Winnipeg, Manitoba to parents of Jamaican heritage. Before joining Muslim Chaplaincy at Ryerson University in 2016, Yasin was a part of the multi-faith chaplaincy team at Queen’s University in Kingston, Ontario. He has lectured extensively on topics such as spirituality and the arts, Black Canadian culture and the history of Muslims in the west. Along with working alongside many non-profit organizations in Canada, Yasin was the first full-time Canadian Muslim chaplain to work with the Correctional Service of Canada, a position he held for 12 years. Yasin has a passionate dedication to expressing Canadian Muslim narratives through the visual, auditory and performing arts.
Amira Elghawaby
Board Member
Amira Elghawaby | Board Member
Amira Elghawaby is an award-winning journalist and human rights advocate. Along with frequent appearances on Canadian and international news networks, Amira has written and produced stories and commentary for CBC Radio, the Ottawa Citizen, the Toronto Star, the Literary Review of Canada, and the Globe and Mail.
Amira spent five years promoting the civil liberties of Canadian Muslims as human rights officer and later, as director of communications, at the National Council of Canadian Muslims (NCCM) between 2012 to the fall of 2017. Amira obtained an honours degree in Journalism and Law from Carleton University in 2001.
Bochra Manaī
Board Member
Bochra Manaī | Board Member
Bochra Manaï has a PHD in Urban Studies from the INRS-UCS. She studied the spatializing of the Maghrebi community in Montreal and the public perception of this ethnicity in Montreal’s urban space. Her interests or research include ethnicity, immigration and cohabitation in the city space. After her doctoral studies, Bochra hopes to research the question of radicalization in Quebec, France and Tunisia to better understand how this process is constructed, especially in the media.
Shiva Mazrouei
Board Member
Shiva Mazrouei | Board Member
Shiva’s academic background is in political science, Middle East studies, and development studies. She is very passionate about human rights, particularly issues facing women, and understanding and elimination of barriers, including poverty, racism and violence. Her particular research interests have included the effects of conflict on women, as well as gender representations in educational material. Given her Iranian background, a love of poetry and the arts runs in Shiva’s blood. She also enjoys travelling and learning about different corners of the world, especially through books, food, and her continuous search for the next perfect cup of coffee.
Our Team
Mohamed Shaheen
Board Chair and Artistic Director
Mohamed Shaheen | Board Chair and Artistic Director
Mohamed Shaheen completed his Bachelor’s degree at Dalhousie University, Halifax, before moving to Montreal to complete his Masters and Ph.D. degrees in Electrical Engineering at McGill University. His doctoral research focused on low-power electronics for mobile and biomedical devices.
Mohamed has been involved over the past decade in several community organizations, where his focus has been on civic engagement, advocacy, cross-cultural exchange, and civil liberties. In 2013, he founded the Silk Road Institute and served as the organization’s Founding Executive Director. He now serves as the organization’s Chair of the Board of Directors. Additionally, he continues to advise several Montreal-based organizations.
Mohamed is a Fellow of the Ariane de Rothschild Fellowship in Social Entrepreneurship at the University of Cambridge Judge Business School. His writings have appeared in the Globe and Mail and the Montreal Gazette, and he has been featured on CBC Radio One. He is also an avid photographer.
Mariam Zaidi
Programs and Development Manager
Mariam Zaidi | Programs and Development Manager
Mariam Zaidi is a South Asian filmmaker, film programmer and arts manager based in Toronto, Canada. Alongside her own independent film work, Zaidi has been fortunate to support the work of underrepresented artists through her years of experience at multiple arts organizations including the Canadian Filmmakers Distribution Centre, Regent Park Film Festival, Hot Docs Canadian International Documentary Festival, Toronto Animated Image Society and Breakthroughs Film Festival amongst others.
Mohamed is a Fellow of the Ariane de Rothschild Fellowship in Social Entrepreneurship at the University of Cambridge Judge Business School. His writings have appeared in the Globe and Mail and the Montreal Gazette, and he has been featured on CBC Radio One. He is also an avid photographer.