2010 Freedom Awards Held...Ghana's James Kofi Annan Returns To The Stage

The 2010 Freedom Awards has been held at the Redondo Beach Performing Arts Centre in Los Angeles.
It was just as uplifting with creativity expert Sir Ken Robinson hosting with his inimitable wit.
The Awards ceremony was graced by some Hollywood stars like Forest Whitaker, Demi Moore, Camilla Belle. Ghana's Rocky Dawuni also performed on the night.
The first Awards ceremony was held in 2008, 200 years after the law prohibiting the importation of slaves into the United States was enacted. Each award salutes an individual who had significant impact on slavery both within the United States and elsewhere, and on the response of Americans and others' to slavery around the world. Their spirit continues on through the individuals and generations they brought to freedom, and today’s abolitionists who are inspired by their legacy.
This year’s winners rescued people from sex slavery on the streets of Washington, D.C., and sheltered them as they rebuilt their lives. They pushed reluctant governments and cautious international agencies to forcefully combat trafficking. They helped farm slaves stand up for their legal rights in courts in India. And they harnessed social media to build a global community dedicated to ending slavery. They represented some of the best anti-slavery work in the world today.
The Freedom Awards are an outgrowth of Free the Slaves’ role within the global anti-slavery movement as an organization seeking to provoke innovative ideas and thoughtful reflection on what techniques have worked and which ones still need to be tried. Free the Slaves is guided by its work with community-based anti-slavery organizations in 5 countries where together they free people from slavery, help them rebuild their lives, and create fundamental change to bring slavery to an end.

In 2008, FTS awarded James Kofi Annan, a Ghanaian and his NGO Challenging Heights for its untiring efforts to end child slavery and child trafficking in Ghana. FTS invited James Kofi Annan again to this year’s Awards to find out from him how the award has helped his organization's work to end modern day slavery.
In his speech, James Annan thanked FTS, saying the Award came with so much exposure, which built his capacity to do what he is doing better. According to him, since winning the Award, he is raising 10 times the amount of money he would have received without it. “Now I help children escape slavery in fishing villages with my new rescue boat and help rebuild their lives in my organization's new rehab shelter,” he stated. This year, the Freedom Award winners were full of "firsts."

For the first time, there was a Frederick Douglass award to an American survivor of slavery who now dedicates her life to freeing others. Tina Frundt was just 14 when she was forced into sex slavery. It took her over a decade to recover. Now, she is the founder of Courtney's House, a direct service provider for minor victims of sex trafficking.  For the first time, a past Freedom Award winner -- James Kofi Annan, a former child fishing slave in Ghana -- returned to the stage. Annan won the Harriet Tubman award in 2008. The global recognition this provided helped him raise more funds than ever before, to expand his anti-slavery work.

Story from peacefmonline.com News:
http://news.peacefmonline.com/news/201011/106285.php?storyid=100