The Managing Director of MSI Australia, the country’s largest non-profit sexual and reproductive healthcare provider, is set to move on after successfully driving almost a decade of organisational and public policy reform.
Jamal Hakim joined MSI Australia as the Chief Financial Officer in 2013, before being promoted to Managing Director in 2019.
Mr Hakim successfully steered the organisation through the challenge of the pandemic and has worked collaboratively to spearhead momentous change in sexual and reproductive healthcare nationwide.
MSI Australia played a key role in the decriminalisation of abortion care, with South Australia the last state to decriminalise the vital health service mid last year.
Australia is now on the road to universal access, with the Senate Inquiry into sexual and reproductive healthcare underway and Medicare item reforms on the horizon.
Mr Hakim said he was proud of his role in securing better reproductive rights for women, pregnant people and the broader community.
“I am a fierce advocate of reproductive justice for all, including the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander community and the LGBTQIA+ community,” he said.
“Abortion remains a postcode lottery in Australia but MSI Australia is committed to providing access, support and choice for women and pregnant people, wherever they may live.
“We regularly pick up the gaps in the public health system through the Choice Fund, which we created in 2018 to support women and pregnant people pay for abortion and contraception who are in financial distress or subject to sexual and family violence.
“Since the pandemic hit, we have had to adapt, overcome obstacles and become more versatile in the way we deliver our services, particularly when the coronavirus pandemic hit our shores in 2020.
“I am very proud of the work MSI Australia does and what we have been able to achieve as an agile organisation, particularly in our transition to virtual health.
“MSI Australia remains the longest running and only national non-profit provider of teleabortion in Australia.
“We are now in a very strong position organisationally, which is why it is time for me to pursue other opportunities and allow new leadership into our organisation.
“It’s important to transition to a new Managing Director smoothly, which is why we will have long period of transition and I will leave the team once recruitment has been finalised.
“I am particularly proud of having steadily modernised MSI Australia, going from being a traditional, aggressively competitive organisation to a dynamic, diverse and collaborative one.”
Mr Hakim said changing the name of the organisation to MSI Australia was a historic and meaningful moment.
“Last year, we changed our name to MSI Australia, before which we were known as Marie Stopes Australia. Marie Stopes was actually a eugenicist and doesn’t reflect the values of our organisation,” he said.
“Following consultation, we apologised to First Nations people subjected to forced contraception, abortion and sterilisation related to institutional and systemic racism in Australia since invasion.
“Colonial violence resulted in thousands of years of health and healing knowledge to be overlooked and prohibited.
“I was proud that we were the first sexual and reproductive healthcare provider in Australia to apologise for these injustices and believe governments and other organisations need to acknowledge this trauma too.”
Mr Hakim retains his positions as a Melbourne City Councillor and on the board of Democracy in Colour.
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For further information contact Anna Jabour on 0428 396 391.
MSI Australia is the only national not for profit provider of sexual and reproductive health services including permanent and long-acting reversible contraception and abortion care. For more information on our clinic network visit msiaustralia.org.au