Oakville MP Anita Anand receives 2022 Global Citizen Award

Oakville MP and Minister of National Defence Anita Anand has received the 2022 Global Citizen Award from the United Nations Association (UNA) in Canada.

The national charitable organization, which educates Canadians on the work of the United Nations and global issues, made the announcement on Thursday, July 14.

In a social media post, Anand said she was honoured to receive the award.

“I believe deeply in the work of the United Nations — including the peace operations to which our Canadian Forces contribute,” she said.

The UNA-Canada said the Global Citizen Award is given to an individual who is making a contribution through their professional and personal lives to building a better world.

“With a mandate to ‘grow global citizens,’ the UNA-Canada recognizes role models who have shown generosity, creativity, leadership and solution-seeking, and applied their talents to the challenges they have identified in their local communities, in the country and in the world,” reads a statement on the UNA-Canada website.

“A Global Citizen need not be a world traveler or professional diplomat. Each of our Global Citizen laureates has, however, contributed to their community, country and world, understood, and shown through their lives that their actions and decisions can be taken for short-term benefit — or long-term elevation of all. As a whole, UNA-Canada’s laureates have shown the courage and determination to lift others.”

Previous recipients of the UNA-Canada Global Citizen Award have included entrepreneur Wes Hall and economist Mark Carney.