At the beginning of the week, the new members of the International Advisory Board of the City of Neu-Ulm were officially appointed by Mayor Katrin Albsteiger. The advisory board consists of a total of twelve appointed members with voting rights and international roots and, in addition, seven advisory members from the Neu-Ulm city council.
In May, the city council had sought candidates for the International Advisory Board through a broad-based advertising campaign. “The response was very good. We received a total of 34 applications from 20 women and 14 men from 24 different nations,” Neu-Ulm’s Lord Mayor Katrin Absteiger is pleased to report. In July, a nomination committee, which in addition to the Lord Mayor also includes representatives of the city council factions and the administration, selected twelve women and men and twelve deputies from the applications received, and made a recommendation for their appointment.
“In their work, the members of the advisory board should not represent certain nationalities or their concerns in the city society, but rather develop a common language as a basis for an equal life in our city. The focus of the work is the harmonious coexistence of all nationalities,” Albsteiger explains the criteria for the selection of the advisory board members.
The members were appointed to the International Advisory Board at a constituent meeting:
Barna Almási (Hungary) / Naima El-Jaouhari (Morocco) / Lina Maria Eraso (Colombia) / Dr. Noémi Földes-Cappellotto (Hungary) / Selcen Güzel (Turkey) / Lili Jia (China) / Irma Mujic (Bosnia) / Dasaradh-Kumar Patchala (India) / Miriam Pellegrino (Italy) / Bulos Rezek (Syria) / Olga Schlegel (Kyrgyzstan) / Nikolaj Simon (Russia)
Deputies are:
Linda Alhijawi (Jordan) / Maria Arruda (Brazil) / Tacettin Canser (Turkey) / Mahmoud Chouchane (Tunisia) / Isa Güzel (Turkey) / Nicole Kramarczyk (Poland) / Dobrinka Stumpp (Bulgaria) / Mohamad Lilienthal (Syria) / Boris Ljuboje (Bosnia) / Almira Shegaj (Albania) / Ana Paula Tschurtschenthaler Damoulis (Brazil) / Porzia Walz (Italy)
The term of office of the International Advisory Board runs until September 2026. Albsteiger congratulated the members on their appointment and thanked them for their commitment. “It is not a matter of course that people engage in voluntary work in their free time. All the more reason for me to thank all the men and women who have agreed to work for greater understanding and cooperation between the cultures in our city”.
The International Advisory Board of the city of Neu-Ulm was established in 2014. It goes back to the Foreigners’ and Integration Advisory Council from 1978 and is intended to represent a spectrum of Neu-Ulm’s international population. It advises the city council and also the administration on all issues relating to migration and integration. The members of the advisory board are volunteers. The committee meets at least four times a year and can also form thematic working groups if required.
