Thread by @AmnestyKenya

#HappeningNow: Join our ED, @irunguhoughton as he discusses Human Rights organizing in Africa during a global pandemic with Dr. Chaloka Beyani as part of @LSE_ID’s #CuttingEdgeIssues lecture series!
Watch here:

“There are a number of walls, whether public or personal, that keep justice away from the horizon of millions of Kenyans and Africans,”@irunguhoughton
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“Over the last 60 years, we have seen in the 24 amendments to the Kenyan Constitution,” @irunguhoughton
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“How is it that constitutions have become sites of contestation?” @irunguhoughton
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“How can the gap be so large between the constitutional vision and the reality that millions of Kenyans face?” @irunguhoughton
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“We did a study in January 2021 on the back of the vicious eviction of the Nubian Community and we called out the ridiculousness of telling people to stay home and you’re evicting them,”@irunguhoughton
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“For human rights organizing, one of the things that we had to do was call for a moratorium,” @irunguhoughton
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“For many people this clamp down brought many people back into their homes and many people lost jobs,” @irunguhoughton on the effects of the pandemic and lockdown efforts on GBV cases and mental health.
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“One of the things we had to think about was how do we get access to people, particularly during the curfew?” @irunguhoughton
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“Human rights organizers had to find new ways of getting to people and this included localized joint community patrols with police officers,” @irunguhoughton
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““I am always left in awe of the capacity of humanity to rise up and call for justice,” @irunguhoughton
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“One of the most powerful moments on the planet during the COVID-19 pandemic was the global solidarity in the case of George Floyd,” @irunguhoughton
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“It gave us the capacity to see each other as activists in the struggle together,” @irunguhoughton
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“One of the important takeaways for me during that show of international solidarity was how important it is for us to be able to connect our lesson and draw lessons from each other on what has worked,” @irunguhoughton
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“Constitutionalism is essentially cemented by the activism of people in very local contexts,” @irunguhoughton
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“If we are not actively claiming space, expanding civic space, and challenging abuse of power, we are not going to be able to build a planet that is able to be a match to the fine words in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights,” @irunguhoughton
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“We have to think beyond the binaries of us and them,” @irunguhoughton
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“Thinking of human rights as anti-state and caught within the prism of international human rights standards rather than domestic political realities is the first block in terms of our vision,” @irunguhoughton
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“I’m no longer interested in funding for human rights projects, I am now asking you to fund independent organisations that can defend human rights and democracy and the only way to do that is to give us resources for us to build assets,”@irunguhoughton
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“What is interesting is the emergence of social Justice community based organizing that is not waiting for donor funding to take action,” @irunguhoughton
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“How do we ensure that communities are able to generate chapters and circle of conscience that are self actualizing?” @irunguhoughton
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“Human Rights started as an international movement from the International Labour Organization to the involvement of the former first lady in getting it included in the UN Charter,” Dr. Chaloka Beyani
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“The greatest risk to human rights is that to has become a professional preoccupation rather than something that has to be fought for,” Dr. Chaloka Beyani #CuttingEdgeIssues

“Most of the measures taken in the pandemic are territorial and only operate within their territorial boundaries,forgetting that the pandemic is a global phenomenon,” Dr. Chaloka Beyani #CuttingEdgeIssues

“One of the powerful things about Amnesty is that we have ten millions supporters globally that can be called upon to wrote letters to dictators,” @irunguhoughton #CuttingEdgeIssues

“What is the impact of policy? What is its intention?” @irunguhoughton #CuttingEdgeIssues

“Public awareness is really critical. It produces public demand for accountability,” @irunguhoughton #CuttingEdgeIssues

“I always say that one of my legacies is to leave the organization with a conviction for the murder of Evans Njoroge,” @irunguhoughton
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“There is a community muscle that always rises to try and sort out an injustice and they always need support,” @irunguhoughton
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“We have to recognize that however generous the finance industry was, large sums of the funding that was for Africa never reached Africa,” @irunguhoughton on the need to challenge resource concentration in the global north.
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“We have to challenge the disinterest of NGOs and national organizations in social movements. The problem is that we don’t allow the social agency to come from within and allow people to take control of their realities and destinies,” @irunguhoughton
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“We must become much more politically bold and audacious,” @irunguhoughton
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