You have won the alternative Nobel Prize. Italy lowers its growth forecast for 2024 to 1.2 percent

Aid organization SOS Méditerranée received the Alternative Nobel Prize on Thursday for its sea rescue operations in the Mediterranean Sea. Activists from Kenya and Ghana and an organization from Cambodia also received an award from the Stockholm-based Right Livelihood Foundation.

SOS Mediterranean

The organization SOS Méditerranée, founded in 2015, “not only saves lives, but also constantly reminds the public, European institutions and national governments of the humanitarian crisis in the Mediterranean.”

SOS Méditerranée, an association with country representatives in Germany, France, Switzerland and Italy, “strictly adheres to international maritime law and high standards” for search and rescue operations, the foundation said.

SOS Méditerranée also collects survivors’ stories and gives them a voice through documentation, the report said. Despite significant obstacles such as ‘politically motivated’ port closures and legal threats, the organization continues its rescue missions with its almost 70 meter long ship ‘Ocean Viking’.

Eunice Brookman-Amissah

Ghanaian doctor and activist Eunice Brookman-Amissah was also honored. She received the award “for initiating a comprehensive social debate on women’s reproductive rights in Africa,” according to the Right Livelihood Foundation.

Brookman-Amissah, born in 1945, paved the way for “liberal abortion laws and greater access to safe abortions.” She plays a key role in the region’s 40 percent decline in deaths from abortions since 2000.

Mother Nature Cambodia

Cambodian youth organization Mother Nature Cambodia also received the award for its commitment to environmental protection and securing living standards.

Despite the government’s increasingly crackdown on civil society involvement, activists are working with local communities and helping “to expose and end numerous environmental abuses in the country,” according to Right Livelihood.

Thanks to their efforts, the organization has become ‘a beacon of hope for future generations’.

Phyllis Omido

Kenyan environmental activist Phyllis Omido also received an award “for her pioneering commitment to the land and environmental rights of local communities and the further development of environmental law.”

Prize winners are “people like you and me”

“What we see with all prize winners is that they work for people who are ignored,” says foundation director Ole von Uexküll. They are “actively changing the power structures” to ensure these people are heard worldwide. These activists are very brave – but they are also “people like you and me,” Uexküll continued. Perhaps the most important message is that anyone can initiate change.

The Alternative Nobel Prize recognizes commitment to peace, sustainability or justice. By 2023, 170 people from 68 countries had been nominated. Previous winners include former US intelligence officer Edward Snowden and environmental activist Greta Thunberg. The prize was founded in 1980 by Swedish-German philanthropist Jakob von Uexküll; his cousin now heads the foundation.

(With material from dpa)