Pierre Johannessen

“It’s a tool we can use to teach kids about their surroundings. In basketball, if you don’t look after the people around you, you’re not going to be successful. It’s that simple. It’s not a man-on-man game, it’s not a one-person game; you can be the best player on the planet, but without a good team, you’re not going to win.”

Pierre was awarded the Chancellor's Young Alumni Award Winner at the 2015 University of Canberra Distinguished Alumni Awards.

Pierre Soheil Johannessen is an Australian Human Rights activist, journalist and recipient of the ACT Young Australian of the Year award for 2010.

In November 2009, Pierre was awarded the ACT Young Australian of the Year Award 2010 as CEO of the Big Bangs. Chief Minister Jon Stanhope presented Johannessen with the coveted award at the National Portrait Gallery recognising his tireless efforts in humanitarian aid globally. [1]

In 2007, Pierre Johannessen was named an Australian Youth Ambassador for Development, and spent 12 months working and living in Bangladesh as a Resource Development and Communications Officer at Habitat for Humanity, Bangladesh.

In 2007, Pierre was accepted as an Australian Youth Ambassador for Development, and spent the next year working with Habitat for Humanity International, Bangladesh. From creating a marketing and fundraising platform to Program Evaluation to the development of Habitat Bangladesh's first disaster rehabilitation program, Pierre immersed himself in Bangladeshi language and culture, and successfully helped revamp the Resource Development Department of the organisation, ensuring the future sustainability of the program.

He then attended the University of Canberra, studying both Law and Journalism, where in 2003 was named the president of the Isaacs Law Society. In 2005, he received a scholarship to attend the University of Georgia, USA, where he was the 1st undergraduate student admitted into the prestigious UGA School of Law. Pierre's concentration was international civil, criminal and human rights law, presenting a paper on the scope, function and jurisdiction of international law on sovereign states.

Born in war-time Iran in 1982, the son of an Iranian mother, Jaleh Hafezi Johannessen, and a Norwegian father, Per Johannessen. Raised in a household of UN Diplomats, Pierre was exposed at an early age to the harsh realities of war and poverty. At the same time he says his parents ensured he saw the incredible resilience and strength of the human spirit, from the Afghan refugees taking shelter on the Iran-Iraq border, to the incredible generosity and openness of Albanian refugees struggling to make a living in modern Greece.