DHARAMSHALA, MARCH 18: A Tibetan member of parliament from Europe Constituency, Chungdak Koren, has submitted her resignation from the 15th Tibetan Parliament in exile citing health reasons. Chungdak has not been keeping well for some time.
Wangpo Tethong, who secured the third highest votes in Europe will replace her. Wangpo Tethong is a Tibetan resident of Switzerland, and has been involved in various services to the Tibetan community including the campaign for jailed Tibetan filmmaker Dhondup Wangchen.
In a statement published on her personal blog, Chungdak wrote that she had informed the Speaker of the Tibetan Parliament Penpa Tsering and Parliament Secretary Topgyal of her resignation on Monday.
“I expressed to them my gratitude and pride of having served as the representative for the Tibetans living in Europe. However, due to the deterioration in my health condition I regret that I am unable to continue to carry out the many responsibilities of a Chitue (Tib: MP), wrote Chugdak.
She further wrote that she will continue to work for Tibet and always keep Tibet in her heart, especially the people inside Tibet. “I will keep working for Tibet until my last breath until we achieve our goal. It is my hope to join my fellow Tibet activists again, those friends I have worked with in Norway for so many years, and those friends of Tibet I had the pleasure to meet during my time as His Holiness’ representative in Geneva.”
“I have no interest in holding on to the Chitue title without being able to carry out my duties, therefore I see this also an opportunity for new people to come forward with new ideas and new energy.”
She has expressed her apology for not being able to complete the full term of the 15th parliament due to her deteriorating health. “Please offer your generous support to my successor. I wish him all the best and encourage him to use this opportunity to come up with fresh ideas in order to realise our dream to live as a free people in this world,” she wrote.
Chungdak’s first stint in serving her community came as a volunteer teacher for a Tibetan refugee school set up by the Department of Education in 1967-68. From 1968-69, she worked as a manager for the cooperative society of the Tibetan Settlement in Sonada, Darjeeling.
She got a scholarship to study nursing in Norway, where she worked for 19 years as a nurse at the Oslo University Hospital. During the same time she was active at the grassroots level in both the Tibetan community and the Tibet Support Group.
She was one of the main initiators of the Norwegian Tibet Committee set up in 1988. In 1989, she was officially appointed by the Office of Tibet London as the Co-ordinator between the Office of Tibet and the Nobel Committee for preparation of Nobel Peace Prize award to His Holiness the Dalai Lama. She is also one of the core initiators in establishing Voice of Tibet, Norway radio in 1996 and continues to be on the governing board of VOT.
From 1995-2001, she was appointed as Representative of His Holiness at the Office of Tibet, Geneva.
In November 2008, she was awarded the Norwegian PEN’s Ossietzky prize for her work for the human rights of the Tibetan people.
She was elected to the 15th Tibetan Parliament in exile in 2011.
There are two seats for Tibetans in Europe in the 43 member Tibetan Parliament in exile. The other seat is currently held by Ven. Thubten Wangchen.
