Leilua was raped by her own biological father at the age of nine and was placed in the Samoa Victim Support Group’s (SVSG) shelter and care in 2011. Following her traumatic experience, she created a Peace Garden in 2017 as her way of healing herself from her experience of gender based violence. She is a Commonwealth Innovation Awards 2019 Peace category winner.
What started out as Leilua’s personal healing process is now used by SVSG to help other children recover from trauma. In 2018, Leilua was nominated and became a finalist for the International Children’s Peace Prize Award coordinated by the Kids Right Foundation of the Netherlands. That December, she was also nominated by the national daily newspaper, the Samoa Observer as one of the Persons of the Year.