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PRESS RELEASE WINNERS OF THE 2020 HUMAN RIGHTS DEFENDERS AWARDS ANNOUNCED
PRESS RELEASE
WINNERS OF THE 2020 HUMAN RIGHTS DEFENDERS AWARDS ANNOUNCED
27 November 2020 – Nairobi, Kenya.
The Defenders Coalition (National Coalition of Human Rights Defenders in Kenya) and the Working Group on Human Rights Defenders announced today the winners of the 2020 Human Rights Defenders awards during a ceremony held in Nairobi at Sarova Panafric Hotel.
The 2020 winners are:
For the fifth consecutive year, and chosen by an independent selection panel of eminent Kenyans, chaired by Rachael Mwikali, the three different awards were handed out to the winners for their outstanding work in the field of human rights. Some of the selection criteria included civil courage, leadership, innovation, demonstrable impact of the Human Rights Defender’s work on the community, and creativity.
“In every community, there are individuals who stand out. They defend human rights, and they do so at times under very extraordinary circumstances,” says Kamau Ngugi, Executive Director of the Defenders Coalition. Kamau further noted that the good bit is that their work is appreciated by the society, “but their work is only known to the communities around them and the areas they have had an impact across the world. The awards ceremony is a special occasion to honour those courageous individuals who do excellent work within our communities.”
The objective of the Awards ceremony is to recognize, honor and appreciate the extraordinary work of Human Rights Defenders in the protection of human rights while they face many challenges in their capacity as agents of social change and transformation. An important aim of the awards is to improve the safety and protection of Human Rights Defenders as they benefit from the visibility and international recognition.
“2020 has tested the world with a range of challenges because of the COVID-19 pandemic. The work of human rights defenders is now more important than ever – in ensuring that human rights are respected as the world combats this virus. The pandemic has affected most aspects of our lives, even the way in which we are celebrating and honouring human rights defenders together through the HRD Awards this year. The Awards enable us to express appreciation of the courage that human rights defenders have shown in a challenging context,“ Elin B. Rognlie, Ambassador of Norway to Kenya
The Awards ceremony is an initiative of the Human Rights Defenders Working Group, currently presided by the Defenders Coalition and co- chaired by Embassy of Norway in Nairobi. The Working Group brings together civil society organizations, activists and development partners to pursue the universal goal of protecting human rights and the defenders of these rights.
For more information, or interview requests, please contact:
Notes to the Editors:
Further details on the 2020 Winners:
Jerotich Seii
Jerotich is a mother, daughter, sister and auntie with a large extended family and tthese roles keep her thoroughly occupied and grounded. Simultaneously, she has spent 23 years in the professional realms of gender, human rights, development, public health, migration management and humanitarian/emergency response.
As an independent consultant, she has no corporate identity and as such, she is free to be a vocal/radical/revolutionary/incisive WHRD. Although she has been a human rights defender for long even in more restricted work environments, her HRD work came to the fore in Kenya following the 2017 elections. With a consistent focus on Energy Justice #SwitchOffKPLC, humanity.ke #HumanityKE and wider governance and anti-corruption themes, she has been able to effectively engage in public education and advocacy using social, print and electronic media; and the occasional demonstration. This is not an accidental strategy but rather a deliberate one that has allowed her to amplify a voice on behalf of WaKenya on a minimal budget.
She began the #SwitchOffKPLC campaign in January 2018 along several other WaKenya in order to challenge injustices faced by electricity consumers in the form of fraudulent/high electricity bills; vendor cartels; meter tampering; opaque tariffs and an all-round unprofessional monopoly, Kenya Power and Lighting Company. This has been greatly influenced by the fact that women bear the public health brunt that comes with using dirty energy sources for domestic work. #SwitchOffKPLC addresses these and many other concerns within the energy sector including constitutional violations and the proliferation of criminally contracted Independent Power Producers.
Turkana Red Vests Movement
This is a group of human rights defenders focused to fight corruption and unequal access to services and opportunities in both government and multinationals operating in Turkana County. Specifically, they were recognized because of their extraordinary contribution, towards the promotion and protection of economic justice, access to water and good governance.
Feminist for Peace Rights and Justice Centre
FPRJC has been working in the community since 2016 as a social movement that mobilized women in amplifying their voices for social change and later transitioned into a legal entity by registering as a community based organization (CBO) in September 2018. A group of young women activists came together to end all forms of violence, abuse and oppression against women, children and sexual minorities and champion for women’s empowerment in the community through feminist principles. Almost all the founders of FPRJC are SGBV survivors and have been on the frontline to champion for societal and attitudinal change in championing for women’s rights.
Feminist centre continued its work despite the hardship of COVID 19 pandemic by giving community hope when organizations were not working. They continued serving different vulnerable people in Kibera by providing basic needs like food, contraceptives to prevent unintended pregnancies, masks and water to the community to continue with handwashing. Feminist centre has been in the frontline documenting, reporting and condemning human rights violations that was simultaneously experienced by the community doing referrals and follow ups. The rescue centre has been a shelter and a safe space to women at Kisumu ndogo who face gender based violence at their homes.
Naila Abdalla
Meet Naila an individual who has a passion for human rights work, community empowerment, rule of law and justice. She is a mother of one and a peer mentor. As a Muslim woman, she seeks to change the narrative and break the cultural barriers that deny Muslim women opportunities to meaningfully participate in development processes to improve their well-being. She started her human rights work as a student leader in high school and after that has been volunteering in various human rights organizations.
In 2017 she founded Sisters for Justice (S4J) to give a voice to the struggles of youth and Muslim women from the Coast. Her efforts saw her organization S4J launched by senior state, non-state and international partners including Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP), Supreme Court Judge Lady Justice Njoki Ndung’u and the British High Commissioner. Her organization has since risen to become one of the leading human rights organizations at the Coast.
In her work she has empowered young Muslim women in her community whose rights have been violated to stand up and defend their rights, including: addressing women cases in court in order to seek justice for them, and following up on gender-based violence cases, extra judicial killing, violent extremism and forced disappearances. This has seen her receive threats and being demeaned by perpetrators who include both state and non-state actors. This year she has been participating in community service work including the distribution of food with Kenya Red Cross during the COVID-19 pandemic
Mathare Roots Initiative is a community-based organization located in the informal settlements of Mathare spearheading activism through art and Artivism. We have over the years created awareness on different human rights issues and violations in our community such as extra-judicial killings by the police, violence against children and women in our community and creating awareness among our community members of their different civic duties.
Mathare Roots Initiative formed in 2006 by a group of young community members and focused its work mainly on empowerment of the youths, but over the years we realized that there were inequalities hindering the empowerment of the youth. That is when they changed their approach to that of Human Rights Defenders, to fight these inequalities that over the years acted as a stumbling block for youth empowerment. One of their very successful human rights work was the Activism through graffiti mural dubbed Artivism, through this they were able to create awareness on different thematic areas including the killing of an eight-year old Yassin Juma in Huruma by the police, these murals have received widespread media attention in both local and international media agencies.
The late Mr. Abubakar Al-Amudy
The late Mr. Abubakar Al-Amudy was an environmental activist who fought for the rights of the communities of Lamu. He was a natural leader and an enthusiast of sustainable development and environmental protection. The late Abubakar Al-Amudy died on June 21, 2020 after decades of advocacy on environmental justice in Lamu County. He co-founded Save Lamu in 2011, which has led the struggle for reclaiming natural and land resource rights in Lamu County.
The late Mr. Abubakar Al-Amudy is a celebrated hero, a retired teacher by profession, role model and a vocal activist who fought many battles to stop the Lamu Coal Plant to protect his community and environment. In doing so, he protected the communities’ natural resources on which they depend for their livelihoods and protected both the environment and natural resources for the future generations.
One of his many achievements was that he co-founded Save Lamu, an organization that is committed to environmental justice and to engage communities and stakeholders so as to ensure participatory decision-making, achieve sustainable and responsible development, and preserve the environmental, social and cultural integrity of the Lamu community.
He was also instrumental in the legal battles against the Lamu Port, South Sudan, Ethiopia, Transport Corridor (LAPSSET) and the Lamu coal power plant which gave the community two landmark wins that recognized the need for adequate environmental impacts assessments for both projects, and appropriate mitigations measures to avoid significant environmental impacts of LAPSSET.
Public Choice Award
Anami Daudi
Anami is a passionate youth advocate for social change and social justice in Kenya. He describes self as an amateur that plays soccer for grassroot football. He is also a mentor and a community organizer. He started his human rights work at an early age but did not he is a human rights defender until 2015 when he started volunteering with human rights organizations.
His human rights focus areas include: gender based violence, police abuse of power, education and general human right violations. He is inspired by the rising number of young people who are coming out to defend human rights from different marginalized communities. He is the coordinator of the Mukuru Community Social Justice Centre.
In his advocacy work, he has managed to organize community members in different thematic sectors to identify problems and come up with solutions e.g environment conservation. He has brought together a group of 300 men to form a CBO to champion for ecological justice. They now own a recycling plant that has a capacity of employing 400 young people but they are yet to be connected to a three face electricity.
The 2020 Human Rights Defenders Award ceremony is hosted by the Defenders Coalition, Embassy of Norway in Nairobi, with the generous support of: Belgium Embassy, France Embassy to Kenya and Somalia, Netherlands Embassy, Germany Embassy, HAKI Africa and Embassy of Sweden in Nairobi.
PR