# Maryan Seylac (Marian Zeila)

> Maryan Seylac (b.1987): Baidoa-born journalist, founder of the Somali Women Media Association.

Source page: https://calankii.com/en/people/maryan-seylac/
Last checked: 2026-11-12
Publisher: Calankii (https://calankii.com)

## Who is she?

Maryan Seylac, sometimes called Marian Zeila, is a Somali journalist and women's rights activist born in 1987 ([Wikipedia, Maryan Seylac](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maryan_Seylac)). She was born in Baidoa, where her father was a teacher, finished primary and secondary school in Mogadishu, and studied journalism at the Kenya Institute of Mass Communication (same source).

## Journalism

After a short time teaching in Baidoa she became a news anchor on local radio, training on the job at stations in Baidoa, Mogadishu and [Bosaso](/en/regions/bari/) ([Wikipedia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maryan_Seylac)). In the United Kingdom she has been a news anchor and reporter on [Universal TV](/en/economy/somali-media-companies/) and Royal TV (same source).

## Somali Women Media Association

In 2006 she founded the Somali Women Media Association (SOMWA) to increase the number of women in Somali media, and she is its executive director ([Wikipedia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maryan_Seylac)).

## Leaving Somalia

In 2009 she left Somalia for Kenya and then England, after insecurity and a number of death threats from al-Shabaab because she was a woman working in media ([Wikipedia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maryan_Seylac)). In 2020 she was studying health and social care at the University of Bedfordshire (same source).

## In short

A radio journalist from Baidoa who founded SOMWA to bring Somali women into the media.

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