March 4 Freedom: Nigussie Nega , Ethiopian Awakening and The Arab Spring

Dr. Negussie Nega is a Senior Policy Advisor with the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). He is also a part-time professor with the University of Phoenix, teaching organizational management and research statistics. Negussie has served the EPA in various capacities for the past fifteen years. Prior to his current position, he served the Agency as a Regional Team Leader responsible for budget and resource allocations assisting the Agency's ten operational regions. He has also served as Environmental Economist with the Office of Radiation and Indoor Air.

Negussie's previous experiences included Senior Financial Economist and Chief Strategic Planner with the Government of the District of Columbia, Research Associate with the Urban Institute, Statistician and Economic Development Analyst with Association on Third World Affairs, and Bank Officer with the First National Bank of Billings Montana. Negussie has over 30-years government and private sector experiences. For his dedication and public service, Negussie has received various awards including the Theodore Higgins Public Service Award, the highest capital city service award, from the Mayor of the District of Columbia and the EPA's Bronze Medal Award for Environmental Protection Outstanding Team Leadership performance from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.

Negussie earned his first bachelor's degree in economics from Carroll College, Helena, Montana. Moving from Montana to Washington, D.C., Negussie attended the American University and earned a master's degree in Applied Economics, with a concentration in public finance and a doctoral degree in management science from the University of Phoenix, Arizona. His doctoral dissertation using regression and correlation analysis focused on the EPA's water resources management. Negussie has also received extensive training, including environmental protection benefit-cost analysis at Harvard School of Public Health, Cambridge, Massachusetts and team leadership and conflict management at federal training facility in Shepherdstown, Virginia.

Negussie is a community activist and the founder of the "One Ethiopia" movement in North America, a movement dedicated to promoting unity, peace, and democracy in Ethiopia. He was engaged in a protracted confrontation with the previous violent communist regime of the Derg and continues to challenge the current dictator's repressive social, environmental, and economic policies. Negussie advocates for democratic governance which embraces rule of law, free press, environmental and economic justices, and a free market in Ethiopia. As one of the community activists in the Diaspora, he regularly lobbies the U.S. Congress, State Department, and global human rights groups and creates awareness on the political repressions and human rights violations in Ethiopia.

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