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Noella Coursaris: The African beauty empowering women
CNN
Dec 21, 2010 - Every week CNN International's African Voices highlights Africa's most engaging personalities, exploring the lives and passions of people who rarely open themselves up to the camera. This week we profile Congolese-born model and activist Noella Coursaris. |
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Noella Coursaris
Georges Malaika Foundation |
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Noella Coursaris Musunka was born in Lubumbashi, Democratic Republic of the Congo. Noella sadly lost her father when she was five years old and her mother, lacking the resources to raise her, sent Noella to live with relatives in Europe. Noella was educated in Belgium and Switzerland and after achieving a degree in business management, she moved to London and embarked on a career in the challenging world of international modeling. Success with her modeling career brought Noella to New York, where she was able to start the Georges Malaika Foundation in mid 2007 in parallel with her active modeling career.
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| © Märzinger Photography |
Bursting with energy and optimism, Noella is an inspiring presence. She is fiercely proud of her African heritage and her determination to help improve the lives of Africa’s youth has made her an international advocate for their welfare. Recently she addressed UNICEF and the Congolese Parliament about issues that confront underprivileged girls; she also participated in the Global Creative Leadership Summit in 2009 as a panelist where she was interviewed by Matthew Bishop, the US Business editor of The Economist. Noella has often been featured in the media, most recently in Italian Vanity Fair in an article honoring her altruism and fearless entrepreneurial spirit.
Noella has facilitated organized visits to Congo for many influential people, including a large contingent from Columbia University and Khaliah Ali (daughter of Muhammad Ali). These visits encourage the international community’s interest and involvement in Congo, but Noella also works tirelessly to promote the dialogue and activism necessary within the Congolese communities themselves to help lead to peace and gender equality. With that goal in mind she helped organize and presented at recent screenings at the Kinshasa and Katanga parliaments, the highly acclaimed documentary film “The Greatest Silence: Rape in the Congo”, which reveals the horrific impact of the war in the eastern part of the Congo and the rape of women and girls.
Noella’s true conviction, however, rests with the development of the Georges Malaika Foundation and its plans for education, and support of institutions and projects that address the needs of girls from her homeland. Noella is also an active volunteer for numerous projects in the Congo independently of her work with GMF. Among the projects that Noella has been involved in is a project with KickStart, an organization that GMF helped establish itself in the Congolese market to enable them to offer efficient irrigation systems to farmers. Another project that Noella has donated her time and expertise to is a project involving the provision of medical supplies to local communities.
With passionate dedication, Noella works to further any cause she believes will empower Congolese to bring socio economic development to their country, allow children the opportunities they all deserve and ignite positive change throughout Africa. |
CNN.com - Connector of the Day: Noella Coursaris
Model Noella Coursaris explains what she is doing to help her home country of Congo.
Dec 9, 2010 |
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