Maselina Iuta

ID: a square graphic on a blue gradient background with the header: “The D-30 Impact List, 2021 Honoree, Maselina Iuta, she/her/hers, Samoa.” Maselina’s headshot on the right. Akii is a Samoan woman with brown hair and is wearing a yellow flower in her hair and a green dress. At the bottom, “Diversability, #D30DisList.”

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Maselina Iuta (she/her/hers)

Program Officer / Deaf Advocate

Samoa

As a founding member and current Project Officer for the Deaf Association of Samoa and a leading advocate in the Pacific region, Maselina has achieved tremendous results in advocating with government and non-government partners to ensure that persons who are deaf and hard of hearing are not left behind, including ensuring the first time provision of sign language in Samoa's national state of emergency communication during COVID-19.

During the COVID-19 Pandemic, Maselina worked tirelessly to ensure that women and girls with disabilities had access to inclusive information and programming. Some of her work includes:

1. Ensuring the provision of sign language in the weekly Prime Minister State of Emergency Address.

2. Ensuring Deaf interpreters on the Ministry of Health COVID-19 Health of the Nation program.

3. Working with the Global Resilience fund to ensure support for grassroots, women, and disability-led responses to COVID-19 around the world.

We asked Maselina if she would like to add anything else to her accomplishments, and she stated: “As a deaf child living in rural Savaii, I didn’t have a lot of access to important things. At 4 years old, I started attending school but with no interpreter, I couldn’t communicate with my teacher. I didn’t have the opportunity to learn sign until I was 13. Now I can sign, I can tell people how I feel when I am sick. I can ask for help. I have the opportunity to work. Through my work, I advocate for my deaf brothers and sisters who haven’t had the same opportunity of access.”