Yetnebersh Nigussie
Yetnebersh Nigussie (born January 24, 1982 in Amhara ) is an Ethiopian lawyer and human rights activist . She is committed to the rights of people with disabilities and their inclusion .
Life
Yetnebersh Nigussie's father came from a family of orthodox priests. She has seven siblings. Nigussie became blind at the age of five due to an infection with meningitis . According to her own statements, she only received treatment in a hospital two years later. The lost eyesight saved Nigussie from an early marriage.
On the advice of her grandmother, Nigussie attended a school for the blind run by Catholic nuns in Shashemene . Her abilities were encouraged here and, according to her own statements, she recognized that women in African society are viewed as socially unequal. Nigussie then attended the Menelik II Senior Secondary School in the Ethiopian capital Addis Ababa and also studied law at the university there . She benefited from the fact that Americans had set up a large library with books in Braille at her university in the 1960s and 1970s . “So we blind people had no problem with the 'old' laws. Our problem was the new laws that came after the change of government in the 1990s [...]. We needed sighted people to read the new laws to us, which we transcribed into Braille ourselves,” says Nigussie. In addition to a bachelor's degree in law and a master's degree in social work , she is currently completing another master's degree in international peace and conflict research at the University of Addis Ababa.
Nigussie converted to the Catholic faith , which is a minority in her home country.
plant
As a student at her secondary school , Nigussie became involved and led the student council. As a student at Addis Ababa University, she co-founded an anti- AIDS movement and in 2006 founded and chaired a female student council.
Nigussie was involved with more than 20 Ethiopian organizations, including the Ethiopian National Disability Action Network (ECDD), which she co-founded in 2005, which campaigns for disabled people and development issues in her home country. She was an Executive Director of the ECDD from 2011 to 2015.
Since 2016 she has been working as inclusion officer for the Vienna -based non-governmental organization Light for the World .
awards
- 2017: "Alternative Nobel Prize " ( Right Livelihood Award ), for "her inspiring work to strengthen the rights of people with disabilities"
web links
- dw.com , Interview , September 26, 2017, Aarni Kuoppamäki: Alternative Nobel Laureate: "One Disability and 99 Skills"
- Portrait at rightlivelihoodaward.org
- Interview with Konstanze Walther, December 1, 2016, wienerzeitung.at: “The logic of being a leader”
itemizations
- ↑ a b c d e f g portrait at rightlivelihoodaward.org (accessed September 26, 2017).
- ↑ a b c d e Walther, Konstanze: On the logic of being a leader at wienerzeitung.at, December 1, 2016 (accessed September 26, 2017).
- ↑ Today: ecdd-ethiopia.org: Ethopian center for disability and development (22 October 2017)
- ↑ Rationale for the Right Livelihood Award
| personal data | |
|---|---|
| SURNAME | Nigussie, Yetnebersh |
| BRIEF DESCRIPTION | Ethiopian lawyer and human rights activist |
| BIRTH DATE | January 24, 1982 |
| PLACE OF BIRTH | Amhara , Ethiopia |