Ken Wiwa

Not to be confused with Ken Saro-Wiwa.

Ken Wiwa (born 1968, Lagos), also known as Ken Saro-Wiwa, Jr, is a Nigerian journalist and author. As of 2013 he was serving as an aide to President Goodluck Jonathan as the Senior Special Assistant on Civil Society and International Media.

Education

Wiwa was educated in Nigeria and at Stancliffe Hall School and Tonbridge School in England and then at the School of Slavonic and East European Studies, which is now part of University College, London. He was editor of the UK Guardian′s New Media Lab where he developed content for the paper's online edition.

Journalist

He moved to Canada in 1999, where he was a writer in residence at Massey College in the University of Toronto, Saul Rae Fellow at the Munk Centre for International Studies at the University of Toronto,[1] a mentor at the Trudeau Foundation[1] in Canada and a columnist for the Toronto Globe and Mail,[1] where he was twice nominated for National Newspaper Awards for Feature writing.

Wiwa has addressed the European Union, Oxford Union and spoken at a number of colleges and universities, including Harvard, Cambridge, McGill. He served as a conference rapporteur at a UN meeting on Cultural Diversity. A regular commentator on major news channels including CNN, BBC, Al-Jazeera, he has appeared as a guest on Hard Talk and Newsnight.

In 2005 he was selected by the World Economic Forum as a Young Global Leader.[1] He was the Founding Curator of the Abuja Hub for the Globalshapers Programme of the World Economic Forum and has also served on the Africa Advisory Council of the Prince of Wales Rainforest Project.[2] He has written for The Guardian in the UK,[1][2] The Washington Post, New York Times and National Geographic. He serves as an Editor-at-Large for Arise Magazine and continues to contribute occasional columns for magazines, newspapers and blogs.

Wiwa has produced and narrated television and radio documentaries for the BBC and CBC.[1][2] He has written commentaries for National Public Radio. His memoir of his father, In the Shadow of a Saint, won the 2002 Hurston-Wright Nonfiction Award.[2]

Special Assistant

In 2005 he returned to Nigeria and the following year former Nigerian President Olusegun Obasanjo appointed Wiwa as his Special Assistant on peace, conflict resolution and reconciliation. He served President Umaru Yar'Adua as the Special Assistant on International Affairs.

He is the eldest son of Nigerian human rights activist and author Ken Saro-Wiwa.[1]

References

  1. ↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 1.3 1.4 1.5 1.6 Trudeau Foundation: Ken Wiwa (accessed 17 February 2015)
  2. ↑ 2.0 2.1 2.2 2.3 World Economic Forum: Ken Saro-Wiwa Jr (accessed 17 February 2015)

External links