Emmanuel Onwe

Emmanuel Onwe is a lawyer, human rights activist, newspaper columnist, and former member of the Nigerian Senate.

A supporter of the need for greater transparency and non-politically driven anti-corruption reforms in Nigeria, Onwe has stated that internal squabbles continue to paralyse the government, which, "if gone unchecked, could result in national paralysis and the tragic death of hope itself." He is also a founding and executive member of the Njiko Igbo Movement.

Onwe was born in Ebonyi State. He received his early education at Our Lady of Fatima (later renamed the Community Primary School) in Ikwo and the Presbyterian Secondary School, Abakaliki in Anambra State.

Onwe studied law on a scholarship at the London School of Economics and Political Science (LSE), where he earned his bachelor's degree. After his graduation, he entered University College London, where he received his master's degree in law and later his PhD in public international law from London University.

Onwe trained as a barrister at the Inns of Court School of Law in London. He was admitted to the Lincoln's Inn Society in 1999 and called to the English Bar. While at the Inns of Court School of Law, Onwe received the Sir Thomas More Award. He later undertook his pupillage at Two Garden Court Chambers, Middle Temple, London.

Onwe has worked for the non-governmental organisations, Y-Care International, Friends of the Earth and Amnesty International. At Y-Care International, he worked chiefly on mobilising and delivering relief materials for the victims of the Rwanda Genocide in 1995. At Amnesty International, he worked in the campaigns department and took a special interest in the organisation's campaigns on issues such as the death penalty and in the 1991–1992 campaign against the Maoist guerrilla insurgent organisation Sendero Luminoso (Shining Path) in Peru. During this period, Onwe attended the historic World Conference on Human Rights in Vienna, Austria in June 1993. The conference gave rise to the Vienna Declaration and Programme of Action on Human Rights. As a prelude to the conference, Onwe wrote an essay published in the New Internationalist in June 1993, which extolled the principle of universality and indivisibility over the concept of the cultural relativity and peculiarity of human rights.

...
Wikipedia