dr kumi naidoo
president, Fossil Fuel Non-Proliferation Treaty Initiative

Kumi Naidoo is a human rights and climate justice activist from South Africa, who currently is the President of the Fossil Fuel Non-Proliferation Treaty and the Payne Distinguished Lecturer at Stanford University. He was Executive Director of Greenpeace International (2009 - 2015) and is the former Secretary-General of Amnesty International (2018-2019). 

Naidoo also served as the Secretary-General of CIVICUS, the international alliance for citizen participation, from 1998 to 2008. He was an activist against the apartheid regime and its educational system in South Africa. Naidoo’s activism went from neighborhood organising and community youth work to civil disobedience with mass mobilisations against the white controlled apartheid government. He has written about his activism in this period in his memoirs titled Letters to My Mother: The Making of a Troublemaker. 

Dr Kumi Naidoo was awarded an Honorary Doctorate of University of South Australia in recognition of his commitment to social justice. He was conferred following the 2019 Amnesty International Oration, Human Rights in a Time of Intolerance and Hate, presented as part of the 2019 Hawke Centre program. 

X: @kuminaidoo
Instagram: @kuminaidoo

Professor Naomi Oreskes
american historian of science

Naomi Oreskes is an American historian of science and author. She became Professor of the History of Science and Affiliated Professor of Earth and Planetary Sciences at Harvard University in 2013, after 15 years as Professor of History and Science Studies at the University of California, San Diego.  She has worked on studies of geophysics, environmental issues such as global warming, and the history of science. In 2010, Oreskes co-authored Merchants of Doubt, which identified some parallels between the climate change debate and earlier public controversies, notably the tobacco industry's campaign to obscure the link between smoking and serious disease. Her latest book, “The Big Myth”, co-authored with Erik Conway explores how government is demonized by many and corporations receive the rights of citizens from our courts. The blame, the authors contend, is the seemingly wrong-headed ideology of economic freedom which seeks to prevent governmental efforts to regulate corporate behaviors at odds with the wellbeing of society as a whole.

X: @NaomiOreskes
Instagram: @naoreskes

THE HONOURABLE MIKE RANN AC CNZM
CHAIR, CLIMATE GROUP

For almost a decade (2002 to 2011) Mike Rann was Premier of South Australia and served as Labor Leader for a record 17 years. He held a range of Ministerial portfolios including Economic Development, Sustainability and Climate Change, the Arts and Social Inclusion. Mike Rann was the National President of the ALP during the Prime Ministership of Kevin Rudd.

In 2012 Mike was appointed Australian High Commissioner to the United Kingdom and in 2014 Ambassador to Italy, Albania, Libya and San Marino. He was also appointed to the Climate Group's International Leadership Council. 

Mike Rann is currently the Chair of the London headquartered Climate Group which operates in 50 countries and has a membership of 260 state and regional governments, and more than 500 corporations.

Mike is also Chair of the UK charity Power of Nutrition and is a Visiting Professor at the Policy Institute of King’s College London. He serves as a member of The Bob Hawke Prime Ministerial Centre Advisory Board, and was part of the 2022 Hawke Centre Program, in conversation with The Honourable Kevin Rudd AC.

X: @Mike_Rann