To commemorate the International Day of the Victims of Enforced Disappearances, the Missing Voices Coalition convened its annual journalists’ training alongside the commemoration, providing an opportunity for 22 journalists to engage on key issues on safe, ethical and accounting reporting ahead of the 2027 elections. Noting that the media plays a critical role in documenting human rights violations, informing public debate, preserving evidence, and amplifying the voices of victims and survivors. Accurate, ethical, and survivor-centered reporting strengthens accountability and supports efforts to prevent future violations.
The International Day of the Victims of Enforced Disappearances, observed annually on 30 August, is a global call to honor victims and their families while reaffirming the obligation of states to prevent enforced disappearances, ensure accountability, and uphold the rule of law. An enforced disappearance occurs when a person is arrested, detained, abducted, or otherwise deprived of liberty by state agents, or persons acting with state authorization, support, or acquiescence, followed by a refusal to acknowledge the deprivation of liberty or the concealment of the person’s fate or whereabouts. The victim is thereby placed outside the protection of the law. In Kenya, enforced disappearances continue to undermine constitutionalism, human rights, and public trust in state institutions. Since 2023, the Missing Voices Coalition has documented 86 cases of enforced disappearances, highlighting the persistence of this grave human rights violation
This four-day workshop convened journalists, editors, and trainers alongside key security, oversight, and protection agencies to examine the intersection of public order policing, misconduct investigations, accountability, witness protection, election reporting in Kenya and strengthening journalists on enforced disappearances. The primary focus was navigating media operations safely without becoming casualties of the environment while doing their work and also helping in documenting the different news of what is happening in the country focusing on the coming general elections in Kenya.
While state officials detailed structural shifts since 2007–2008 and 2020— including early election deployment, increased restraint, and a doctrine of proportionate force—participants actively critiqued these assertions against ongoing challenges like enforced disappearances, high-profile cases (e.g., Ol Kalao, Kasarani, Homa Bay incidents and how they have been handled) among others, and a mapped network of 134 political gangs in Kenya was highlighted as the troublesome groups who disrupt, distract and cause harm/ danger to the citizens, the journalists that sometimes result into deaths and loss of property.
The training concluded by equipping journalists with actionable tracks like; managing data privacy laws, reporting on international crimes and forensics plus enforced disappearances, crime scene management without contaminating evidence, and institutionalizing care for vicarious trauma, pathway accountability for grievous atrocities, election related human rights violations and well-being and protection among others.