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19.12.2008 Feature Article

Ashoka As An Example Of Human Rights Protection Agency

Ashoka As An Example Of Human Rights Protection Agency
19.12.2008 LISTEN

As the world just marked the human rights day, there are people who touched our lives and we can't avoid remembering them. For those who might be on the amiss, I am not a fellow of Ashoka, but I have come to realize the importance of saying, thank you, when a deed is done either to me or to anybody.

Especially during this period of human rights day, it is our duty to say in a special way, thank you, to individuals and organizations who have always, in one way or the other, stand for humanity, sometimes to the detriment of their lives. Ashoka is one organization I have come to realize that has been helping individuals and institutions that have unique ideas in a special way since 1980 it was founded. So, here is my big, thank you, to Ashoka.

In analysing the great works Ashoka is doing to better mankind, His Royal Highness, The Prince of Wales, Prince Charles reportedly said, “I have been greatly impressed by the pioneering work of Ashoka in promoting social enterprise for many years as a pathway to talented individual. They have done much to spread good practice and role models in many countries”.

What is faith without work? asked the Holy Bible. We can't be fighting for the protection of human rights without first analysing those things that cause the abuse of human rights. Sometimes it is not the extra-judicial killing or any other form of abuses on the human integrity that is the primary abuse to human rights but when people are not cured of their quest for hunger of food. And that is what Ashoka, the American based humanitarian organization has been doing since it was founded in 1980.

It was gathered that the Ashoka was a child of experiences its Founder and President, Mr. William Drayton, had with the civil rights movement in the United States and his travels to Asia. Since then, Ashoka has been creating impact across the globe that many people are not familiar with. This organization is bent to building social entrepreneurship and shapes the entrepreneurial sector of a citizen across the globe, which it has been consistent with since the 1980.

Since it was founded, Ashoka has elected more than 2,000 fellows working in over 50 countries. What does these fellows do? They support the individual's idea and institution to gain much knowledge in their respective careers. In 2005, Dr. Chichi Anigolu, Ashoka Nigeria representative reportedly said that Ashoka operates in nine West African countries with Nigeria as the first in 1991. She also opined that “there are 55 fellows in Nigeria with 70 percent of them in the South. Ashoka presents an alternative standard of development discourse and is leading social entrepreneurial development”.

As many years have gone since Ashoka started its good works on humanity, if Nigerians could gain such feat between 2004 and 2005, it then means that Nigeria have had many Ashoka fellows triple or more than the number in 2005 that are working in the fields of education, health, human rights, economic development and civil participation.

Ashoka, meaning the active absence of sorrow, has really helped thinking-minded individuals to send sorrow to exile, when they are yet to be explored. And the unique feature of this great organization is that its fund-raiser is not governmental. Ashoka has made tremendous difference stepping into people's lives when it was hazardous for others to do so. There is no other way to help man attain his aged long quest to climax in his endeavours than what Ashoka is doing. Ashoka is not only empowering individuals and institutions, but also making dreams not to die with the dreamers.

Odimegwu Onwumere is the Founder of Poet Against Child Abuse (PACA), Oyigbo, Rivers State. +2348032552855. [email protected]

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