Date:
Location:
“Nigeria's National Mental Health Act and Beyond: From Colonialism to Human Rights”
Speaker:
Chime Asonye, Founder, Nigerian Mental Health; Former Associate, Office of the Senior Special Assistant to the President of Nigeria on the Millennium Development Goals.
Contacts:
Jacob Olupona
Olupona@fas.harvard.edu
Darren Kew
Darren.kew@umb.edu
Co-sponsored by the Center for Peace, Democracy, and Development (CPDD), UMass Boston.
This event is online only. Please click the "Read More" link for full instructions on how to attend this seminar.
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Abstract:
Earlier this year, Nigeria's President made history by signing the National Mental Health Act into law, marking the first legislative reform adopted in the field since the country's Independence. Nigerian Mental Health, the nation's largest multidisciplinary network of mental health practitioners and organizations, was one of the leading forces to help secure its passage by coordinating stakeholders and advocacy to advance the legislation. Founder, Chime Asonye, will detail his journey to establish the organization and its efforts to pass the Act, which inaugurates new human rights-focused protections for those with mental health conditions. He will also share insights on disability inclusion in governance and what is next for efforts to improve psychosocial support in Nigeria and Africa.
Speaker Bio:
Chime Asonye is a lawyer, policy advisor, and development practitioner. Currently, he serves as the Founder of Nigerian Mental Health, the largest multidisciplinary community of mental health stakeholders in the country, with over 30+ mental health-focused organizations, working to advance policy advocacy, wellness programming, and research. His thought leadership on psychology issues has been featured in Harvard Africa Policy Review, CNBC Africa, and the World Economic Forum, among others.
Chime has worked with organizations like the United States House of Representatives Subcommittee on Africa and Global Health, the Africa division of the International Republican Institute, and the Permanent Mission of Nigeria to the United Nations. He has also spoken at academic institutions like the University of Chicago’s Emerging Markets Summit and Harvard’s African Development Conference about his efforts on the Continent.
As a consistent advocate for Africans, he is a former Commissioner on the Washington, D.C. Commission on African Affairs; member of the Abuja Global Shapers, an initiative of the World Economic Forum; and is currently leading a series with the Africa Center in New York focused on elections, governance, and foreign policy in Africa. Asonye graduated with a Bachelor of Arts in Political Science and Philosophy from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. He also has a Juris Doctor from Northwestern University Pritzker School of Law in Chicago and received its International Alumni Award in 2021.
