Garmondeh Clinton - Member Profiles - Community

Home

Community

Member Profiles

kid

Member Map

kid
Garmondeh Clinton


Title and Organization:		Founder/Executive Director, Youth Peace And Human Rights Network, Inc
Gender and Age:		Male, 27
Location:		Newark, New Jersey
Country of Residence:		United States
Country of Birth:		Liberia
Nationalities:		Liberian
Citizenships:		Liberia
Languages:		English



Website:		http://www.yopnet.org
Instant Messaging:		To protect the privacy of members, Instant Messaging information is only available to logged in members of TakingITGlobal. Login or Sign up now, it's free!

About Me

Garmondeh Clinton was born in the West African nation of Liberia. At the age of seven, his country was hit in 1989 with a bloody civil war which lasted for fourteen unbroken year. Growing up with a life compounded with brutality, exploitation, abuse, poverty, and diseases, childhood was a nightmare. The conflict claimed over 300,000 lives. As a young person he witnessed instances of young people being forced to fight and take drugs. He also saw young girls raped and children left on the streets to die from starvation. Personally, Clinton lost his brother, grandfather, several other relatives and friends and almost lost his life as a result of malnutrition.

In 1995, Clinton resolved to take action to curb the wave of violence by joining the Voice of the Future, a local child rights advocacy group that worked with UNICEF to protect children. He participated in advocacy, sensitization, awareness raising and was a key member of the 1996 Children’s Disarmament Campaign, often risking his life to reach out to front warlords and frontline commanders to disarm child soldiers. He also participated in the UNICEF 1996/97 International Children’s Day of Broadcasting making the plight of Liberian children to the world. He became a founding member of Liberia first Children’s Bureau of Information that produced the Liberian Child newsletter and the Golden Kids News, with help of Search for Common Ground, and later served as its director.

As Chairman of the Liberian Children’s Peace Mediation Committee, Spokesperson of Students’ National Peace Secretariat, and Executive Member of the West African Youth Network for Peace, he led several peace matches pressuring warring parties and the international community to end the chaos in Liberia and the Mano River Basin. His quest for peace took him to neighboring Sierra Leone, Ivory Coast, Guinea, and Nigeria persuading African leaders and other stakeholders to take action. Clinton founded and headed his children’s rights group Peace Child Liberia which worked successfully with UNICEF Liberia in setting up the Liberian Children’s Parliament.

His role as peace ambassador and human rights activist was highly disliked by Liberian warlords and suffered constant harassment, intimidation, and threat on his life at the hands of their armed militias. By July 2004, it was clear that he had to flee Liberia for his life. Garmondeh Clinton had since been granted political asylum in the United States of America. His latest effort is the Youth Peace and Human Rights Network.

Clinton’s reputation as an outstanding for peace and human rights afforded him the opportunity to have participated and spoke at the following international meetings:

 Millennium Young People’s Congress-Honolulu, Hawaii, October 1999

 West African Youth Summit-Monrovia, Liberia, 2001

 United Nations General Assembly Special
Session on Children—New York, 2002

Countries Visited

This map requires Flash Player 8 or higher.
Click here to get the latest Flash Player.