Description:

Clementine Nkweta-Salami (United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) regional director for East, Horn and Great Lakes Region) will discuss the effect Covid-19 is having on refugee populations in Africa with Norwestern University's Galya Ben-Arieh (Political Science, Director of the Colloquium on Refugees, Migrants and Statelessness, Northwestern University). This event is sponsored by Northwestern University's Program of African Studies, the Center for International & Area Studies, the Colloquium on Refugees, Migrants & Statelessness, and the Melville J. Herskovits Library.

This event is free and online, but attendees must RSVP in advance for a link to the Zoom event.

Speaker bio:
Ms. Clementine Nkweta-Salami assumed her functions as the Director for the Regional Bureau for East and Horn of Africa and the Great Lakes Region (EHAGL) in August 2019. The EHAGL Regional Bureau covers 11 countries including Burundi, Djibouti, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Kenya, Rwanda, Somalia, South Sudan, Sudan, Tanzania and Uganda and the UNHCR Representative’s Office to the African Union and United Nations Economic
Commission for Africa (RAUECA). Ms. Nkweta-Salami also oversees UNHCR’s engagement with the East African Community (EAC), the International Conference of the Great Lakes Region (ICGLR) and the Intergovernmental Authority for Development (IGAD).

Prior to her arrival, Ms. Nkweta-Salami was UNHCR’s Representative in Ethiopia where she served for four years. She also served as UNHCR’s Regional Representative for Southern Africa accredited to the Republic of South Africa, based in Pretoria, overseeing UNHCR’s operations in Angola, Botswana, Lesotho, Malawi, Mozambique, Namibia, Swaziland, Zambia, Zimbabwe and the Indian Ocean island countries.

Ms. Nkweta-Salami previously served as Representative for UNHCR in Burundi. Prior to that assignment she served as Assistant Representative (Protection) in Guinea as Chief of the Inspection Section in the Inspector General’s Office and as Senior Legal Advisor in the Department of International Protection at the agency's headquarters in Geneva. She has many years of experience managing complex humanitarian situations and on refugee issues.

Ms. Nkweta-Salami holds a Master’s degree in Corporate and Commercial Law from the University of London, an LLB in Law from University of Warwick, UK as well as a Bachelor of Sociology and Political Science from the University of Ottawa, Canada. She is a barrister and a member of the Bar of England and Wales as well as the Cameroonian Bar Association. She began her professional career working as an attorney in Cameroon and has worked for UNHCR since 1993 with her first postings being in Benin, Sierra Leone, Nigeria and Tanzania. Ms. Nkweta-Salami is fluent in French and English.