New Straits Times 12 Nov 10;
NILAI: Former United States president Bill Clinton urged students and guests attending his talk yesterday to become their own non-governmental organisations by contributing their time and skills to the world's future.
"Each one of us needs to become our own NGO, by contributing towards the growth and well-being of our community and country and the world as a whole by doing our part as responsible citizens.
"You don't have to be a billionaire like Bill Gates or a former president of a country, like me, in order to make a difference in the world. You have the power to do whatever, regardless what the circumstances are," he said in his address to students, business and government officials at Inti International University, here.
Clinton is the honorary chancellor of the Laureate International Universities, which owns Inti.
Also present were Lauerate Education chairman and chief executive officer Douglas L. Becker and Inti International University chairman Tan Yew Sing.
Clinton said the 21st century world, which was the most independent age of human history, had three main challenges to overcome: inequality, unsustainability and instability.
"There is a limit to what governments, private corporations and NGOs can do, and this is where private citizens and communities come in to help cope with the challenges of the modern world.
"For example, there is a rapid rate in climate change where global warming and melting ice caps are a cause for concern. We have to do something about environment unsustainability," he said, adding that Greenland's melting ice caps might render northern European countries uninhabitable.
He described Malaysia's pledge to reduce carbon dioxide emissions by up to 40 per cent by 2020 as a promising effort in helping the environment and the economy.
On inequality, he said the lack of a proper system in poor countries had caused a great deal of suffering.
In places such as Haiti, for instance, 75 per cent of the people live on less than US$2 (RM6.40) a day while a billion people worldwide are living on less than US$1 a day.
"These people are living below the poverty line. It is dramatically unequal and that inequality is going to cost an enormous amount of social unrest and political upheaval."
On the world's third major challenge, Clinton said the things that made all the information available to us on the Internet also made the world unstable.
"Networking can be good, but it is also an opportunity for disaster."
Clinton also answered a question from an undergraduate student on what this generation could do that the previous generation couldn't.
"You should not worry about what you can't do but more about what you can do and find like-minded people to help do your part together.
"The ability to have a choice is a liberating feeling and whatever choices you make in life, it shouldn't stop you from being a responsible citizen in order to make the modern world work."
On a question on world peace, Clinton advised people to be respectful of each and everyone's faith and belief.
"Spend more time thinking of good things rather than only worrying about bad things."
