Nigeria’s ex-president, Goodluck Jonathan wins 2025 Sunhak Peace Award
Nigeria’s former President Goodluck Ebele Jonathan has been announced as the winner of the 2025 Founder’s Sunhak Peace Award to be presented by the Sunhak Peace Prize Foundation in Seoul, South Korea on April 11.
Mr. Jonathan, who was Nigeria’s president between 2010 and 2015 becomes the third person and the first African leader to win this category of the Sunhak Award, after former United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon, and Prime Minister of Cambodia Hun Sen.
The Sunhak Peace Prize Committee stated that Mr. Jonathan is being honoured with the Founder’s Prize because of his consistent mediation and pro-democracy activities to bring peace throughout Africa. Especially through the instrumentality of the associations he chairs, including the Goodluck Jonathan Foundation (GJF), the West African Elders Forum (WAEF) and the International Summit Council for Peace (ISCP).
The Founders Sunhak Peace Award and the Sunhak Peace Prize are two categories of awards presented biennially by the Committee to individuals and organisations acknowledged as worthy contributors to world peace and human development.
Prominent past winners of the second category, which is the Sunhak Peace Prize, include former Senegalese President Macky Sall; President of the African Development Bank (AfDB), Akinwumi Adesina; and Sarah Catherine Gilbert, co-developer of Oxford AstraZeneca vaccine as well as GAVI, the Vaccine Alliance.
Mr. Jonathan will receive his award alongside three recently announced by José Manuel Durão Barroso, Sunhak Peace Prize Committee chair and former President of the European Commission, as winners in the other category. They include Patrick Awuah Jr., Founder and President of Ashesi University in Ghana; Hugh Evans, co-founder and CEO of Global Citizen; and Wanjira Mathai, Regional Director for Africa at the World Resources Institute.
The founder of the Sunhak Peace Prize, Hak Ja Han Moon, who leads an interreligious and international movement for peace, stated in her pre-event address that the lives of the laureates had been an inspiring reminder to how peace can be realised through concrete actions and cultural transformation.
She said further: “Over the past decade, the Sunhak Peace Prize has identified and honoured individuals who have dedicated themselves to addressing urgent global challenges based on its three core values: respect for human rights, reconciliation of conflicts, and ecological conservation.”
Established in 2015, the biennial Sunhak Peace Prize honours individuals and organisations that have shown extraordinary service to global peace and well-being in one of three areas: sustainable human development, conflict resolution, or ecological conservation.
Written by Ikechukwu Eze, Special Adviser to H.E. Dr. Goodluck Ebele Jonathan.
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