Grassroots Human Rights Defenders (GHRDs) and social movements play an important role in Kenyan Civil Society. GHRDs are often the ones present on the ground, documenting cases, collecting evidence and speaking to victims and community members. As such, they are very visible and vulnerable to possible aggressors, but may lack the resources and the networks to provide for adequate protection. Since its inception, PBI Kenya has been providing solidarity and protection to GHRDs and support to social justice processes. Additionally, PBI Kenya continues to actively increase the reach and visibility of GHRDs in Nairobi’s urban settlements.
“The right to life is the most fundamental of human rights, and extrajudicial killings violate this very fundamental right, which is protected under various international human rights mechanisms and treaties.” Examples are the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights. The Constitution of Kenya also protects the Right to Life.
In October, ten HRDs from the Social Justice Centres (SJCs) participated in a Training of Trainers (ToT) on community organizing. The participants are experienced community organizers from various SJCs in Nairobi. This particular training helped them to improve their skills in analyzing the community’s situation with fellow community members and seeking solutions together.
Missing Voices is a group of organizations whose mission is to end enforced disappearances and extrajudicial killings in Kenya. Missing Voices organises public campaigns to highlight extrajudicial killings and enforced disappearances and puts the stories of victims and their families in the centre. Find out more on www.missingvoices.or.ke Their website provides current numbers of extrajudicial executions and enforced disappearances and profiles of the victims and the circumstances under which their death or disappearance occurred.
‘Saba Saba - then and now’ documents the perspective of activists who participated in the struggles in the 1990s: their aspirations, their cause and the hurdles they encountered. How did they overcome those hurdles and at what risks did this come?
Then the film zooms in on the organizing going on today. What are the struggles, what is the response of the governments and how are human rights defenders supported? There are lessons learned from then and now.
2021 was a year of regenerating so much of what was lost, put on hold or forgotten the year before with the Covid-19 pandemic. Priorities and plans have shifted and PBI, along with so many other organisations, has been reflecting on and adjusting our work to ensure that the protection we provide to human rights defenders (HRDs) across the world remains relevant and responds to their urgent needs.
“A picture is worth a thousand words” is an adage that we all know and it is one example of
‘HRDs in action’ is a photobook that portrays the grassroots human rights defenders of the social justice centres in action.
PBI Kenya, together with other PBI entities and the members of the Social Justice Centres Working Group held a virtual speaker tour between 20th November to 10th Dec 2021. The speaker tour addressed the following issues with the UN officials, foreign governments, international NGOs, and fellow HRDs from other countries: violations of freedom of peaceful assembly, extrajudicial killings, the 2022 general elections and the safety of HRDs.
At PBI, the safety and wellbeing of human rights defenders are paramount. PBI Kenya embraces the concept of holistic ‘human security’ that entails freedom from fear, freedom from want, and freedom to live in dignity. This security goes beyond physical to include economic, health, environmental, personal, and community elements of life.
In September, we published a simplified handbook on the Sexual Offences Act, 2006. This handbook,