OYW Ebola Petition-UN

It is important for young people to not only be cognizant of the world’s most pressing problems but to actively help solve them even through small means. If we ignore the need for action, we also ignore a better future and create room for the fears and tragedies that exist in our new generation today. Sometimes we overlook our actions, but we must understand that every little action we take has its own value when it comes to creating change in the world. The Ebola March and Petition campaign we implemented started small, but it ended with a big impact at the One Young World Summit 2014 in Dublin, Ireland.After six weeks of civic leadership training experience in the United States, I returned to Liberia in August. In mid-September 2014, I started my journey to represent Liberia at the One Young World Summit in Dublin, Ireland.  One Young World works to gather the world brightest young leaders together without discrimination and empowers them to make lasting connections to create positive change. I was selected among many others to serve as flag bearer and delegate for Liberia. Being selected among hundreds of young Liberian leaders to attend the One Young World Summit was a competitive process.  The One Young World 2014 summit was the one of the biggest in the event's history.

This year, the summit was scheduled for the 15th -18th October 2014.  During that period, I was experiencing painful consequences as a result of the Ebola Outbreak. Liberia, Sierra Leone and Guinea needed more assistance to stop the virus in the Manor River region. Governments and international organizations were not doing much. I realized additional global calls, especially from the youth, were needed to demand world leaders to act now, not tomorrow, as Sir Bob Geldof vehemently teaches us.   What more could I do? The One Young World Summit was the perfect place to initiate involvement of youth from around the world. It was only two weeks ahead before the start of the biggest One Young World Summit. All was already planned even before the Ebola Outbreak started and rapidly spread.  The outbreak was so rapid in Liberia that many airlines canceled their flights to and from Liberia.  On September 30, 2014, I wrote the OYW event executives with a proposed plan for a Ebola Walk (March) during the summit period.  

In addition, I posted on the 2014 delegates Facebook group with the proposed idea and also requested support from fellow OYW delegates toward the plan.  In few minutes, I got about 15 responses from delegates who expressed interest in idea.  I read all their suggestions and connected with them immediately via Facebook in order to initiate direct conversation with them.  Through this process, I got in touch with Luwam Estifanos,  a delegate from Eritrea. From that point on, momentum built and, Luwam and I continued to spread awareness on the idea through Heather Sophia Turney,Saba Nafees from the United States, Matthew Brown from Australia, Ts'epo Moleleki from Lesotho, and few other delegates from Ireland and other countries who also expressed deep interest and joined the planning process. I also got in contact with Debbie O Rourke, an Irish human rights activist, and member of the Liberia Solidarity Group Ireland who also enthusiastically joined the team. We connected online via different platforms and organized the march and an Ebola Petition letter to WHO.    We organized everything online and the OYW event executives approved the work a day before the event.  Unfortunately, I could not attend the summit in person to present the petition myself, but I asked Heather Turney who was one of the co-organizers to present the petition on the team’s behalf.  She did that successfully and by the end of the Summit, we were able to have more engagement from young leaders around the world as we had originally dreamed.

The petition was presented to the acting Director-General of the UN in Geneva who passed it on to the Head of the WHO. During the final day of the summit, our group implemented a march for Ebola in the streets of Dublin with Saba Nafees representing me to present a closing statement. This march was held in front of the famine memorial, the significance of which was related to marchers by Ms. O’ Rourke. Loud chants of ‘fight Ebola’ echoed down the streets as young leaders from many different countries united for a global cause. The outcome of that small idea was big impact. Our action is now being used as a preference to the OYW First Counselor’s readiness to act. Sir Bob Geldof is announcing the launch of Band Aid 30 in aid of the Ebola Crisis in West Africa.  There is much work to be done. We must unite and act now, not tomorrow. My sincere thanks go to everyone supporting the nobles initiatives which strive to end Ebola. Also read about the 2016 one Young World Summit.