An unpaid UN intern has resigned following international uproar that he was living in a tent because he could not afford sky-high rents near the organisation’s Geneva headquarters.
David Hyde, 22, from Christchurch, New Zealand, announced his decision after it emerged that he was living on a patch of grass in the Swiss city, which has some of the highest rents in the world.
The international relations graduate had travelled 11,000 miles after securing the placement, but soon wound up on a patch of grass on the banks of Lake Geneva - near the UN’s private beach club and the city’s botanical garden - in a tent that was “not the most waterproof”.
Speaking at the gates of the UN’s European HQ, Mr Hyde said: “I’m announcing my resignation from the United Nations internship programme.
Unpaid #UN intern David Hyde forced to live in tent near the UN Beach Club http://t.co/FRCtyx56yi
— Olalla Tuñas (@olalla_tunas) August 11, 2015
“It’s my own decision and I chose to resign because I felt that it would be too difficult to continue to focus on my work as an intern at this stage.”
The conditions of the unpaid internship, and his circumstances, meant that sleeping in a small, blue tent – complete with camping stove and foam mattress – “made it the only real possibility that I could see”, Mr Hyde said.
READ MORE:
He reiterated to The Guardian that “no person forced me to sleep in a tent” and that he was fully aware that the UN was offering “no wage or stipend, no transport help, no food allowance, no health assistance”.
But he added: “Call me young and call me idealistic but I don’t think this is a fair system.”
Lake Geneva
According to the Tribune de Geneve newspaper, which broke the story, Mr Hyde had received a number of offers of accommodation – offers he apparently turned down – and his parents were unaware that he was camping.
Mr Hyde told reporters he had previously been turned down for internships by the UN after he was unable to say how he could support himself. But when he did not tell the truth, he was accepted, he said.
An UN spokesman, Ahmad Fawzi, told the Local that a general assembly resolution barred the organisation from paying interns.
