Theme: R(E)volution

TEDxYouth@NavalHill is an independently organised TED-like event that features young speakers from diverse fields. Our speakers present ideas worth sharing and engaging with. We believe strongly in the ideas of the young and we are committed to creating a platform for youth to express them.

This year, our theme is Revolution. Evolution or R(E)volution. Ideas have the power to spark revolutions across diverse facets of societies from political revolutions to tech revolutions. We want these revolutions to end in evolution - to make anything better than it was before.

University of the Free State
205 Nelson Mandela Drive
Bloemfontein, Free State, 9301
South Africa

Lehakoe Masedi

Social Reformer + Competitive Debater

Lehakoe Masedi is a postgraduate law student at the University of the Free State and student assistant at the Gender Desk of the Institute for Reconciliation and Justice. She is the former President of the University of the Free State Debate Society. In the sphere of competitive debating, she is a two-time top ranking adjudicator at the World Universities Debating Championships and the former South African Women's Debate Open champion. Her interest is social justice, especially for black people and black women.

Linda Fekisi

Journalist + Editor

Linda Fekisi is a contributor for The Journalist, an online media platform dedicated to providing contextual storytelling. She is the leader of its Free State circle, a group of student contributors, based at the University of the Free State. Linda is a former cadet for ANN7 and The New Age newspaper. She’s also worked on a Xenophobia campaign with Kagiso media and produced a current affairs show for Kovsie FM during her days in student media. She is the chairperson of the Association of Catholic Tertiary Students (ACTS) at the University of the Free State where she is currently reading towards a Master’s Degree in Media Studies and Journalism.

Richard Chemaly

Attorney + Author

Attorney, author and journalist, Richard has had a wild ride through a haphazard career stemming from corporate law, to human rights, to strategic consulting, to selling beer on the internet. Richard quit his day job, jumped on a train and began touring South Africa bouncing between various friends' couches, Tinder matches, his childhood bed and his apartment in Hillbrow. Over the last 7 months, he has frequented 217 different pubs, bars and taverns, collecting stories in an ambition to self-reflect and challenge the mechanics of the world. He has only one tattoo and it reads, "fiat justitia ruat caelum". When people ask him what it means, he snobbishly, yet incorrectly, answers, "Don't you speak Latin" when it really means, "Justice must be done even though the sky may fall"...a reminder of his life's ambition to prove the world wrong through the light of his justice.