International Studies

I received the e-mail below from recent BGSU graduate, Martina Hanulova. If you would like to contact her or hear more about her work, please e-mail me at kfoell@bgsu.edu and I will put you in touch!

Dear Friends,

I hope this email will reach you well. I would like to share with you few updates from my work with UNDP country office in Sierra Leone.

My project, Open Government Initiative (OGI), aims to increase the accountability and transparency of the 3 branches of government by enhancing the visibility of these institutions, and by creating a platform for an open communication between the Government and the citizens. The project is an initiative of the President Ernest Bai Koroma who in his premier address to parliament in October 2007 stressed the importance of accountability, transparency and higher performance standards in public service.

OGI has conducted four successful interactive field trips since September 2008 with all focused entirely on the Presidency. Our recently concluded phase targeted the Legislature that I was lucky to be part of. Currently, OGI is embarking on its last phase, focusing entirely on the Judiciary. These town hall meetings will be organized to elicit community participation in finding workable solutions to the problems affecting the Justice sector.

In the last week of October, OGI organized its first judiciary town hall meeting. I must stress that this is the first time in the history of Sierra Leone that representatives from the Justice sector faced the public directly. The panelists who took part in our first judiciary town hall meetings were: High Court Judge, Master Registrar, Magistrate, representative from Bar Association and Law Reform Unit, representative from Ministry of Gender and Children’s Affairs, President of 50/50, Director of Prisons, Inspector General Office, Director of Anticorruption Commission, Representative from Ministry of Local Government and Internal Affairs, Human Rights Commission, and Solicitor General.

Before the end of the year, we plan to conduct 2 more town hall meetings with the Judiciary (in Bonthe and Kailahun Districts)

I am attaching an in-house report that I put together after our first Judiciary town hall meetings held in Kambia Town, Kambia District. I am also attaching a feedback survey report from our last parliamentary this town hall meeting held in Kabala Town, Koinandugu District.

I hope you are all well.

Kind Regards,

Martina Hanulova

Are you sick of “reselling” your textbooks at the end of a class only to get pennies on the dollar? Do something that will make you feel good instead of cheated: donate those books for global literacy! At the end of each summer session, International Studies will be collecting books to send to Better World Books. ALL kinds of books are needed: some will be donated directly to Books for Africa, some will be resold on the BetterWorld website (with a portion of the proceeds going to Books for Africa), and anything unusable will be recycled.

Please note that BetterWorldBooks is a for-profit organization with a social purpose. Their usual arrangement is to pay a commission to the book drive organizer and make a donation to the designated non-profit; IS is directing its “commission” to go directly to Books for Africa, so we will NOT make money on this and the charity will get double its usual amount. Since BetterWorldBooks provides all collection, advertising, and shipping materials, and pays shipping costs, there is no cost to International Studies or BGSU.