Honorary Members
Honorary Members are people who are no longer representing a member institution or organisation but are still willing to cooperate within the Platform Network to fulfil its objectives.
Honorary Membership
Honorary Membership may be offered to any person who has given outstanding performance to the Platform Network over a number of years and is no longer in employment, or has moved from employment, which entitled them to representative membership. They may be proposed by any member to the Secretary and voted on by members at General Assembly. If the Honorary Member does not attend a general assembly for five years she or he should be contacted to ascertain their wish to remain as an Honorary Member.
Roland Marent (Austria, Vorarlberg)
first attendance: 1986
honorary members since:
Heinz Rhomberg (Austria, Vorarlberg)
first attendance: 1992
honorary members since: 2007
Katrien van Belle (Belgium Flanders)
first attendance: 1997
honorary members since: 2003
Göran Nilsson (Belgium Flanders)
first attendance: 1994
honorary members since: 2000
Göran started in the Platform network as director of the department of Leisure, Youth and Sports of the City of Umeå (Norrbotten , Sweden) in 1994. Umeå organized the GA of the Platform in 1996 and he became a honorable member in 2000 in Slovenia , when he stopted working I Sweden and came to live in Belgium (he met Katrien van Belle in the meeting of 1997 and married her in 2010). He worked in Brussels for a year in the North-Sweden office . He was very active in the Troika since 1995 uptill 2005. He now is assessor for Erasmus+/YIA and retired. He has 4 grandchildren and 1 plus- grandchild.
Margaret Medland (England, Kent)
first attendance: 1986
honorary members since:
Liz Heaney (England, Kent)
first attendance: 1986
honorary members since:
Erik Haggman (Western Finland)first attendance: 1991
honorary members since: 2003
Guylia Jilk (Hajdú Bihar)
first attendance: 1991
honorary members since: 2000
Mr Guyla Jilk was head of the Youth work in Hadju Bihar county, Hungary. Hungary , Hadju Bihar, has been member of Platform Network 1991- 2010.
Mr Guyla Jil was very an active member who was creating Platform Network organization and corporation.
The Declaration of Platform has been created by Mr Guyla Jilk, Mr Erik Häggman (FI) and Mr Franz Muller(LU).
Martin Zehren (Germany, EVEA) first attendance: 1991 (until 2003)
honorary members since: 2002
Martin Zehren (born 1927) was a teacher, he lead a primary school for several year and worked for many years voluntary in the field of youth work beginning in the 1950's. He was involved to establish the cross-national youth work after the second world war in the boarder region of Germany, Luxembourg, Belgium and France for the EVEA.
He lead, organized and supported dozens of youth exchanges, projects and activities in between the 1960s and 1990s.
Hi first attendance as representative for the EVEA at the Platform Network was in 1991. He was coorganizing the 1996 General Meeting at Kyllburg, Germany. He became an honorary member in 2002.
Martin Zehren is suffering Alzheimer's disease and living nowadays in a special care residence.
by Franz Bittner, Ralf Ollinger
Ritva Saarikettu (Finland): 
first attendance: 1996
honorary members since: 2008
Ritva Saarikettu is a concept ‘an sich’ in the Platform. She has been a member of the Platform since 1993. She became honorable member in Lublin in 2008 and that was well deserved. Ritva has been since the beginning the most active person in the network and she participated in the Troika since 1993. She organized the Platform meeting in Villa Elba in 1993, 2002 and 2013.
She is the personification of an ‘intercultural’ person with the quality to listen, to try to understand, to find compromises, to be open to other opinions and cultural differences. As such she has been able to motivate a lot of young people to take part in a youth exchange or in an intercultural experience. She has contacts all over the world: Villa Elba and Kokkola are known by a lot of youth centres and youth organisations and it has a very good reputation: working with Ritva is always a pleasure: to the point and very efficient. I have a lot of respect for her and furthermore she is and will always be a very dear friend to both Göran and me.
by Katrien van Belle
Franz Muller (Luxembourg)
first attendance:
honorary members since:
Claudine Neven (Luxembourg)
first attendance: 1996
honorary members since: 2010
