₿trust, a non-profit organization focused on training and funding developers from the global south to develop open-source Bitcoin, recently announced Bitcoin Core contributor and one of its board members, Abubakar Nur Khalil, as interim CEO.

1/ 📢 Exciting news from ₿trust!

We are pleased to announce that Abubakar Nur Khalil (@ikhaat1999), Nigerian Bitcoin Core employee and current board member, has been appointed interim CEO of ₿trust photo.twitter.com/km5iYQU6Pe

— Btrust (@btrustteam) August 8, 2024

The non-profit was founded in 2021 and received initial funding from Jay-Z and Jack Dorsey. Since then, it has built an ever-expanding network of Bitcoin developers in Africa, Latin America, and India.

₿trust has trained hundreds of developers, including some working on projects like Libreria de Satoshi and Bitshala, launched BitDevs meetups in five African cities, and supported annual events like the African Bitcoin Conference.

Nur Khalil will serve as interim CEO for one year, starting in August 2024. During this period, he will retain his seat on the board of directors and will not be a voting member.

This role should sound familiar to Nur Khalil, as he founded the organization, originally called Qala, before ₿trust acquired and rebranded the organization.

Other board members of the trust have expressed confidence that Nur Khalil will be an excellent leader for the organization, given his expertise as a developer, the fact that he is based in the Global South (Nigeria), and is one of the leading voices in the African Bitcoin ecosystem.

“Since I first met him, Abubakar has been resolutely focused on supporting the advancement of Bitcoin and open source development in Africa, the Global South, and beyond,” said ₿trust Founder and CEO Fedi Obi Nwosu. “I’m grateful that he has taken on the challenge of leading ₿trust through this early formative phase, and I’m excited to see what he will accomplish in this role.”

As interim CEO, Nur Khalil will focus on expanding ₿trust’s developer pipeline, increasing the number of grants the institution makes, and improving its developer program to continue its mission of decentralizing Bitcoin’s open-source development.

“I am truly grateful for the trust of the board to take on this role in the coming year,” said Nur Khalil. “I look forward to growing our initiatives, ensuring that ₿trust cements itself as the primary driving force behind Bitcoin development in Africa, and cultivating a unique Bitcoin FOSS ecosystem in the regions we serve.”