2020-05-26

OSCE AiB graduate Medet Suleimen: I truly believe young people’s voices should be heard

My name is Medet Suleimen (2013 graduate of the Politics and Security Programme) and I could proudly say I am an alumnus of the OSCE Academy. The experience I gained at the Academy helped to become a professional at my work. I have been working since 2014 as a Programme Officer for the Friedrich Ebert Foundation Kazakhstan Office in Almaty (thereafter FES Kazakhstan). I manage a wide array of projects in the fields of foreign policy and youth policy. I am involved in all stages of project management and bear responsibility for their implementation, including research activities. The foreign policy direction of FES Kazakhstan consists of a variety of projects on different issues like regional water security in Central Asia, fostering regional security cooperation among Central Asian states and Afghanistan, and other issues. One of my successful projects was to organize an annual regional conference where the experts from the former member-states of the Soviet Union discussed actual issues for every other year such as religious extremism, inequality issues, digitalization in the region.

I managed various projects on youth policy, mainly on political education and boosting youth participation in the decision-making process. I run the project on modeling the parliament process for active youth to get knowledge about legislative processes and how young people could participate in it. It is a fulfilling experience to see young people from all over Kazakhstan discussing problems and how they could help to solve them. I truly believe that young people’s voices should be heard.

Another success story of ours was the Zhascamp project, an annual youth camp dedicated to discussing human rights issues and alternative political visions in Kazakhstan. In addition to all mentioned above, I managed a project on war history and holocaust studies, the exhibition on life Anne Frank. The aim of the project was to raise awareness about the Holocaust and give more insight into memory studies for young people all over Kazakhstan.

In 2017 I was supported by my Foundation to gain more international expertise and had a chance to apply for the International Parliament Scholarship Programme, a five-month fellowship at the German Parliament. This was a great opportunity to work for an MP while attending Humboldt University. It enabled me to gain valuable experience for my work having a chance to see democratic traditions and procedures for youth in action and attracting more attention and interest for the Central Asian agenda for MPs and researchers from German think-tanks.

Finally, last year I became a Head of the Alumni Association of International Parliament Scholarships holders. This gave me an opportunity to contribute more to fruitful cooperation between Germany and Kazakhstan bringing more expertise to my country.

I would like to express my gratitude for the continued support from the OSCE Academy in my interest in international relations, that offers a wide range of seminars, training, webinars and others. I am thankful to be part of the OSCE Academy Community!