Blog by Alice Pomè, SI Youth Forum Member.
The SI Youth Forum is a community that was established in 2023 for young Soroptimists (aged 40 years and under) to engage with one another at the international level by sharing ideas, advocating for change and organising inter-Federation projects.
“The future is ours and we must take the chance to change the path”, writes SI Youth Forum member, Alice Pomè from Italy.
Soroptimist International’s Youth Forum joined the Young Activists Summit online, that took place at the United Nations in Geneva on 16 November 2023. The theme of this years’ Summit was ‘Peace and Reconciliation’.
The discussion touched upon several issues related to human rights, including women and girls’ rights, as well as the devastating impacts of climate change. The five young speakers, who were the selected recipients of the Young Activists Award 2023, highlighted their personal stories and explained how their advocacy is working to address barriers to equality and social inclusion.
Young Activist Summit Speakers
The first recipient, Francisco Vera, is a 14-year-old Colombian boy that is fighting for environmental protection. He started advocating for climate justice at the young age of nine, when he saw governments of South America destroying the Amazon rainforest, one of the richest and most biodiverse spaces on Earth; an essential resource for the sustainable future of our planet. Francisco began educating other young people about the ongoing destruction of the Amazon. So far, he has built a network of over 1,000 students and is now collaborating with schools to ensure that climate justice is a key area of learning for all young people. However, Francisco’s advocacy efforts have placed his life at such a risk that he had to leave his home country of Colombia. He currently lives in Spain.
The second awardee, Nisreen Elsaim, is a 29-year-old woman from Sudan. She, too, became a climate activist after experiencing the devastating consequences that climate change is bringing to her country. However, Nisreen did not only talk about the issues happening nowadays in all African countries, but she also mentioned the critical situation Sudan is facing due to political instability. In a place where people need to find food every day, education and human rights are being left behind. This is a worldwide problem that Nisreen is pushing on the tables of international and national bodies in her role as Chair of the UN Secretary-General’s Youth Advisory Group on Climate Change. Due to the ongoing conflict in Sudan, Nisreen was forced to flee her country in April 2023. She has since resettled in Italy.
The third recipient, Sawyedoullah Maung, is a 22-year-old refugee from Myanmar. Subjected to forced displacement simply because of his ethnicity as an indigenous Rohingya, Sawyedoullah now lives in a refugee camp in Bangladesh. Determined to ensure the fulfilment of the Rohingya’s people’s human rights, he founded the Rohingya Student Network where he works to educate and empower other young people in his community. He helps other young Rohingya refugees to improve their life conditions.
The fourth awardee, Roshni Perween, is a 25-year-old girl from rural India. At the age of just 13, Roshni was forced to marry a 45-year-old man. Roshni became a mother at the age of 14. The issue of child marriage in India is deeply complex despite it being illegal for any minor under 18 years old to marry. Roshni suffered mentally and physically, but she found strength within herself to go against the system. Roshni is now a social activist and has succeeded in saving dozens of girls from forced marriage. She works with local authorities and community leaders to highlight the issue to the young generation by raising awareness and encouraging the inclusion of girls in education.
The final award recipient, Maimouna Ba, is a 27-year-old girl from Burkina Faso. She works to address the lack of education in her country. Convinced that poverty and non-education foster violent extremism, Maimouna founded an association to help displaced woman work in farming and local handicrafts. Supporting women in becoming community leaders, Maimouna also succeeded in facilitating over 60 children to go back to school. She escaped from the Yirgou massacre with her family in 2019 and now lives on the border between Burkina Faso and Nigeria.
Conclusions
Listening to the testimonies of the five young award recipients from very different places in terms of political and social conditions, it is clear how their voices have been persecuted by their leaders. They have had to flee their homes and sometimes move away from their families in order to be messengers of hope to ensure a peaceful future for entire communities.
What emerged from the Young Activist Summit is the absolute desire of the young generation to be listened to, including the need for young people to be given a meaningful space at the decision-making table. As we heard several times in the Summit, the future is ours and we must take the chance to change the path.