Southern Africa
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ANGOLA: ‘Chances for real democracy in Angola are quite low’
CIVICUS speaks about the recent presidential and National Assembly election in Angola with Pascoal Baptistiny, Executive Director of MBAKITA – Kubango Agricultural Benevolent Mission, Inclusion, Technologies and the Environment. MBAKITA is a civil society organisation based in Cuando Cubango province in southern Angola. Founded in 2002, it defends the rights of Indigenous peoples and traditional communities, denounces the discrimination they suffer and the expropriation of their lands, and promotes a more just, democratic, participatory, tolerant, supportive, healthy and humane society.
What was the political climate in the run-up to the recent election in Angola?
The political climate was veryunfavourable, not at all conducive to a free and fair election. Angola was alreadycharacterised by heavy restrictions on civic space, and this worsened in the run-up to the 24 August election.
Civic space has been long marked by persecution, intimidation, threats, arbitrary arrests, judicial harassment, slander, defamation, censorship, intolerance and ordered killings. Protests are often banned and frequently repressed, sometimes with lethal violence.
Restrictions tightened before the election and were maintained during the voting and in the aftermath, to prevent protests at suspected fraud. Rapid Intervention Police, State Secret Information Services, Public Order Police, Migration and Foreigners Services, Border Guard Police, Criminal Investigation Services and the Attorney General's Office were all deployed in the streets of Angola’s 18 provinces.
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ANGOLA: ‘Much effort was put into excluding people from the electoral process’
CIVICUS speaks about the recent Angolan election and its aftermath with Catarina Antunes Gomes and Cesaltina Abreu from the Social Sciences and Humanities Laboratory of the Catholic University of Angola (LAB). LAB works closely with Civic Movement Mudei (‘I changed’ in Portuguese), a movement of multiple civil society organisations (CSOs) that advocate for democratic change in Angola. It campaigns for voting rights and fair conditions of electoral competition, including transparent funding, equitable media coverage and citizen monitoring of election processes.
What kinds of civic space restrictions did Angolan civil society encounter during the election?
Civil society has faced many constraints before, during and after the election. Prior to the election, there was a partial review of the constitution that was done without any consultation and did not follow the recommendations of the African Charter on Democracy, Elections and Governance. The organic law on general elections was also amended without the participation of civil society or the political opposition, and it resulted in reduced electoral transparency. Key stakeholders were denied a platform to be part of the process.
A few months before the election, the government also decided to change Angola’s political and administrative division, with potential impact on the drawing of electoral districts. Although it did not follow through with this reform, this caused great confusion and gave rise to suspicions about the intentions of the ruling party, the People’s Movement for the Liberation of Angola (MPLA), and the credibility of the election.
In 2021 President João Lourenço appointed Laurinda Cardoso, a member of the MPLA’s political bureau, as chief judge of the Constitutional Court. Civil society also raised concerns about the appointment and swearing in of Manuel Pereira da Silva as the new president of the National Electoral Commission. But our voices have been overlooked during the whole process.
The media situation has also been very precarious. Since the start of the electoral process, state intervention has increased, even in private media. Mudei monitored the media coverage of various parties and candidates from May until July and found that both public and private media had become instruments of propaganda, undermining the right to freedom of information and free choice.
On 6 July, just as the electoral campaign was about to begin, a new law was proposed to prohibit surveys and posts revealing voting choices. Instead of ensuring people were fully included in the electoral process, much effort was put into excluding them.
As a result, the level of transparency and fairness of the 24 August election has been dubious to say the least. It has been questioned by civil society through many public statements. The organisations we work with, Mudei and LAB, have produced a statementindicating they do not consider the elections to have been transparent, fair and free.
What do you think contributed to low voter turnout?
There were probably many reasons why fewer than half of registered voters went to the polls, but we believe major ones were disorganisation, fear and lack of trust.
The whole process was badly organised. In September 2021 there was an ‘unofficial electoral registration’ period, which is really a process of connecting databases to determine who is eligible to vote, but it was not made clear to people what this was about. Most people were confused about what the law said on residency and voting. The process was marked by lack of clarity and irregularities. Everything seemed too complicated so many lost interest. Many people were excluded as a result.
People were also afraid. The electoral campaign should be a time when candidates share their ideas with us, debate their parties’ proposals and tell us their thoughts about Angola’s future. But this was not what happened. The ruling party had a strong negative discourse, treating the other parties as enemies rather than adversaries. They didn’t present any ideas on how to make the country progress and what they published as their political programme was of very low quality.
Staying away from the polls can also be interpreted as a form of protest. We have done a lot of comparative electoral analysis and found that protest voting has increased in Angola through the years. This is the result of people’s complete lack of faith in political institutions, given their limited democratic character and lack of transparency. This year the protest vote rose even further.
How has the Angolan government reacted to civil society’s criticisms of electoral irregularities?
The government has responded with repression. There are two situations that we would like to share with CIVICUS and other international allies so they can help us by providing visibility, pressuring human rights international bodies and offering support in the form of capacity-building and funding for human rights activists and social movements in Angola.
The first situation concerns Pascoal Baptistiny, executive director of MBAKITA, a CSO that promotes the rights of Indigenous peoples and traditional communities in the province of Cuando Cubango in southern Angola. Pascoal has expressed concerns about the election, including in an interview with CIVICUS last year. This made him a target. He was put under surveillance and has recently requested our help to evacuate his family to Luanda, Angola’s capital, because he has been threatened and is afraid for their safety.
The second situation concerns several members of Mudei, including its coordinator, who has been threatened repeatedly. Another of our colleagues, who was an independent candidate, has been mentioned in aggressive articles and social media posts along with an official from the European Union delegation in Luanda. They are attacked as part of a supposed subversive conspiracy involving powerful international interests aiming at destabilising Angola.
The feeling of oppression has been increasing. The Angolan army has been put on high alert, allegedly to prevent attacks. But how would unarmed civilians be able to attack them? That is clearly an excuse; their presence is threatening and intimidating. We urge the international community to publicly denounce what our government is doing to people and act to protect civil society activists who continue to work regardless and face threats and violence as a result.
Civic space in Angola is rated ‘repressed’ by theCIVICUS Monitor.
Get in touch with Mudei through itsFacebook page,and follow@MovCivicoMudei on Twitter.
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ANGOLA: ‘The new NGO Law is just a way of legalising the government’s arrogance and excesses’
CIVICUS discusses the state of civic space and the new restrictions being imposed on the work of Angolan civil society with Godinho Cristóvão, a jurist, human rights defender and executive director of the association Movimento de Defensores de Direitos Humanos de Angola (Movement of Human Rights Defenders of Angola, KUTAKESA).KUTAKESA is a civil society organisation (CSO) working for the rights and protection of human rights defenders (HRDs) in Angola, particularly those active in more vulnerable areas, working on more sensitive issues and from historically excluded groups.
What are the current conditions for civil society in Angola?
Angolan CSOs work in a climate of suspicion and uncertainty, despite the fact that the Constitution of the Republic of Angola enshrines a catalogue of citizens’ fundamental rights, freedoms and guarantees.
The Angolan authorities should have aligned themselves with the democratic rule of law and respected the work of CSOs and HRDs. Instead, there has been an increase in threats, harassment and illegal arrests of HRDs who denounce or hold peaceful demonstrations against acts of bad governance and violations of citizens’ rights and freedoms. There have been clear setbacks with regard to the guarantee of fundamental rights and freedoms enshrined in the constitution, as well as the rights set out in the African Charter on Human and Peoples’ Rights and other human rights treaties Angola has ratified.
How is the government targeting civil society with restrictive legislation?
The attacks on civil society are totally uncalled for. On 25 May, the Angolan National Assembly passed a draft NGO Statute, despite severe criticism from CSOs, which have stated that it limits freedom of association and gives the state excessive powers to interfere with CSO activities.
The government targets civil society with legislation that is meant for terrorists and money launderers, though it has never been proven in any court that a CSO has committed an act of terrorism in Angola. On the contrary, the rationale of this legislation constitutes institutional terrorism, the target of which are CSOs.
In Angola we all know who the corrupt are, and which party feeds corruption and money laundering. And as far as we know, CSOs are not part of that group. Funders of Angolan CSOs are all clearly identified, and the transfer of funds goes through national banking institutions and a rigorous compliance process. It is also worth remembering that many CSO funders are the same ones that fund government projects.
How does the new restrictive law compare with the 2015 decree that was declared unconstitutional?
In general, the content and spirit of Presidential Decree 74/15 on the Regulation of NGOs are the same as those of the new NGO Statute Law. By way of example, the rights and duties chapter of the previous regulation, later declared unconstitutional, was retained with only minimal changes in wording that in no way alter its content and its controlling and repressive spirit.
Additionally, the decree that was found unconstitutional provided for an administrative body under the tutelage of the Angolan executive – called IMPROCAC – with the power to monitor and control CSO actions. The recently approved draft NGO Statute Law provides for a similar body with the same attributions as the old IMPROCAC.
In other words, this is a new attempt to impose similar restrictions, but it is more serious since its instrument is no longer a presidential decree but a law. This means that it is no longer only the executive that is attacking the principles of autonomy and freedom of association provided for in article 48 of the constitution, but Congress as well, in which the president’s party, the Popular Movement for the Liberation of Angola (MPLA), has a majority. It is worth remembering that it was the MPLA majority that approved the 2010 constitution which it is now violating by passing the NGO Statute Law.
How is civil society, including KUTAKESA, reacting to the proposed law?
CSOs, at least the most active ones, are not looking favourably on the approval of this law, given the threats it represents in terms of closing off civic space in Angola.
We are taking joint action to prevent the final approval of this law and its entry into force. From the point of view of legal certainty and security, the courts should be aligned with the principle of jurisprudential precedent. Since they submitted the presidential decree to a review of unconstitutionality and declared it unconstitutional, they should now follow suit, given that the new law contains the same irregularities.
All national organisations took a joint position to call on parliament to take off the agenda the law now approved. This was done through information exchange meetings with opposition parties represented in parliament. At the same time we made public statements alerting the public about the dangers for freedom of association if the law was approved, and we made urgent appeals to the special rapporteurs of the African Commission on Human and Peoples’ Rights and the United Nations (UN) who have a mandate on freedom of association and HRDs to alert the Angolan government about the consequences the law will have on respect for human rights.
On KUTAKESA’s part, urgent appeals were made to the African Commission on Human and Peoples’ Rights, the Special Rapporteur on the Situation of Human Rights Defenders in Africa, Remy Ngoy Lumbu, and the UN Special Rapporteur on the Situation of Human Rights Defenders, Mary Lawlor.
Do you see the new law as part of a wider trend to restrict civic space?
Yes of course, but it is also important to note that the repression of peaceful and legal demonstrations predates the approval of this law. Government mismanagement and endemic corruption have been some of the main causes of the deteriorating social, economic and family conditions for the majority of the population, leading to growing protests and mass demonstrations, which have often been repressed. The approval of this law is just another means of repression and of legalising the arrogance and excesses of the government and its agents, particularly the national police.
While the law is not necessarily intended as a response to the ongoing protests, given that the attempt to get it passed dates back to 2015, it is likely to be used as another tool to crack down on the protests.
Now, if the government has good sense and makes a strategic reading of the current political and social context of Angola, it could stop the process of approval of the law or, if it is too late for that, the president could refuse to promulgate it, taking the appeals of civil society into consideration. The law’s approval would certainly increase the number of protests and demonstrations.
Civic space in Angola is rated ‘repressed’ by theCIVICUS Monitor.
Get in touch with KUTAKESA through theirwebsite.
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ANGOLA: ‘The untrue government narrative reveals an aversion to civil society denouncing malpractice’
CIVICUS discusses the state of civic space and the new restrictions being imposed on civil society in Angola with Emilio José Manuel, focal point for Angola of the Lusophone Platform for Human Rights and founding member of the Working Group for Human Rights Monitoring in Angola (GTMDH).
The GTMDH is a platform of civil society organisations (CSOs) that works to promote and defend human rights and strives for social justice within the framework of the Angolan constitution and other current laws, as well as international conventions and treaties.
What are the conditions for civil society in Angola?
Although there is currently no direct or indirect interference in the work of civil society in Angola, the authorities’ discourse is that, because they receive funding from international institutions, CSOs defend and represent foreign interests.
Meanwhile there are many joint actions between public institutions and CSOs. For example, once a year the Ministry of Justice and Human Rights organises a forum with CSOs where the GTMDH presents its public position on human rights and provides information on the granting of registration certificates, the legal documents that the Angolan state gives to each CSO attesting that it is legally registered and can operate in the country.
Why is the government targeting CSOs with legislation aimed at terrorists and money launderers?
According to the report supporting the draft law, the president considers that he has ‘encountered constraints and difficulties in ensuring compliance with international obligations assumed by the Angolan Government in the area of money laundering and the financing of terrorism’. Hence the need to control the sources and destination of CSO funds.
This narrative of the Angolan government is untrue and clearly demonstrates its aversion to the role of CSOs in monitoring and denouncing government malpractice. Financial support for the projects of CSOs and human rights defenders comes from well-identified organisations and goes through banking institutions with strict compliance rules – and some of these funders are the same ones that support government projects.
On 26 May, the draft NGO Statute Law was passed in general by the Angolan National Assembly, ignoring severe criticism from civil society, which has made clear that it limits the right of association and gives the executive excessive powers to interfere in CSO activities.
The situation is very alarming because the draft law imposes a 120-day period for existing CSOs to make their statutes conform with the law, otherwise they will be outlawed outright without a judicial decision. Article 2 of the draft law requires existing CSOs to conform with the new provisions, under penalty of having their statutes and registrations revoked. This is a violation of the principle of legality and access to justice guaranteed by the Angolan constitution. The principle of legality requires that the law should be clearly articulated and known in advance and should not be applied retroactively.
How has civil society reacted to the draft law?
Civil society analysed the draft law and reacted against it. In collaboration with the GTMDH coordinator, my role as legal officer was to prepare petitions, public position papers and communications with the United Nations (UN) Special Rapporteur on Freedom of Peaceful Assembly and of Association, and to engage with regional and international partners to amplify the voices of Angolan civil society.
We requested a technical opinion from UN Special Rapporteur Clément Voule and drafted a public civil society position on the bill explaining why it violates freedoms of association, which we presented publicly at a press conference.
We advocated with opposition parties represented in parliament and made contacts with the Angolan Bar Association to file, within the scope of our constitutional prerogatives, the appropriate action for an assessment of the unconstitutionality of the draft law. The day before the general approval of the draft law, we sent a public petition to the National Assembly demanding that it not approve it.
Our next action will be to send a letter to the presidents of some key countries about the closure of civic space in Angola and increasing controls over CSOs, including international CSOs.
Protests are also taking place against the proposed NGO Statute Law, which have converged with protests against measures that have increased fuel prices and a crackdown on street vendors.
Do you see this bill as part of a wider trend of restricting civic space?
The recent repression of demonstrations, arrests of activists and attacks on protesters, including women, is an indicator that civic space is being severely restricted. The use of force by the national police has resulted in deaths without any appropriate process to hold to account and punish police officers involved in cases of violence, torture and killings.
Our country depends on importing food staples and other goods from abroad. Right now the prices of food, other goods and services have increased. Street vendors are a group that some CSOs work with, particularly those dedicated to empowering women to establish small businesses. Some organisations provide micro credits to street vendors. Although the street vendors’ movement has a life of its own, it is CSOs and their lawyers who have provided them with free legal aid.
There is a current of national solidarity, taking into account that the law does not explicitly say it will regulate all initiatives by citizens who wish to create an association. My personal opinion is that everyone feels that control will go further. The draft NGO Statute Law lacks a clear definition of what a ‘non-governmental organisation’ is. It also includes vague provisions that need to be better fleshed out to enable the proper interpretation of the law. For example, it is difficult to understand the meaning and normative scope of article 19(1)(d), which imposes a ‘duty on NGOs to refrain from practices and actions that are subversive or liable to be confused with them’. The unanswered question here is how subversive actions are to be defined in the context of the law.
How does the new draft law compare with the 2015 decree that was deemed unconstitutional?
According to the analysis we’ve made, the arguments and contents are the same as in Decree 74/15 on the Regulation of NGOs. We have the new role of counselling judges in the Constitutional Court. The situation in the Supreme Court indicates that we have a crisis in the judiciary. So it is uncertain whether this time the judicial decision will be in favour of CSOs. The present draft law establishes rules to control, restrict, approve, authorise and suspend the activities of CSOs, including CSO extinction by an administrative entity to be determined by the president as holder of the executive power, which violates the principle of freedom of association as provided in article 48 of the constitution.
Do you view the draft NGO Statute Law as part of a regional or global trend?
After having participated in sessions of the NGO Forum and the African Commission on Human and Peoples’ Rights, I noted a tendency to restrict civic space throughout Africa. As part of the civil society strategy, we held meetings with activists from Mozambique to share experiences and assemble regional, continental and international strategies. It is worth remembering that various activists, whether linked to CSOs or not, are directly involved in campaigns and waves of protest to try to ensure that the draft law is not given final approval by parliament and promulgated by the president.
Civic space in Angola is rated ‘repressed’ by theCIVICUS Monitor.
Contact GTMDH through itswebsite.
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BOTSWANA: ‘We must strategise so that we don’t merely react to crises and anti-rights action’
CIVICUS speaks about the struggle for LGBTQI+ rights in Botswana with Dumiso Gatsha, an LGBTQI+ activist and founder of Success Capital.Success Capital is a youth and feminist-led organisation working to strengthen youth agency and autonomy in human rights and sustainable development while challenging power, privilege and patriarchy through intersectionality. Its approaches include participatory research, peer-to-peer knowledge sharing and advocacy.
Has the 2019 High Courtruling that decriminalised same-sex relations led to improvements?
The 2019 ruling had structural effects: by declaring the criminalisation of same-sex intimacy unconstitutional, it eliminated not only the possibility of prosecution but also the excuse that was often used to exclude LGBTQI+ people from service delivery. It affirmed our existence as Batswana, Africans and people and heralded a new field of untapped opportunities for improving the lives of all people in Botswana, not only LGBTQI+ people.
Documented instances of violence against queer people in social settings, hate speech and intolerance online have increased. This doesn’t mean violence itself has increased – only that it is now more visible. Decriminalisation has improved the environment to report on and seek redress for human rights violations, injustices and inequities.
However, there has also been backlash, and violence may be on the rise as a result of the higher visibility, agency and advocacy by LGBTQI+ people.
It’s true that in Botswana there weren’t any immediate negative reactions to the High Court ruling, unlike in countries such as Kenya or Namibia, where progressive judgements elicited immediate protest action. But, reflective of wider and broader anti-gender ideology influences, earlier this year there have been protest marches led by churches, a whole four years after the High Court ruling. This means that for those opposed to LGBTQI+ rights, the matter is far from settled.
The anti-rights reaction was triggered by a member of parliament’s request to consult with churches on the procedural steps parliament needed to take to amend the Penal Code in line with the 2021 ruling by the Court of Appeal that upheld the High Court’s decision. From what we understand, this ruling was needed to finally put the matter of decriminalisation to rest, having ensured that all processes had been exhausted within Botswana’s jurisdiction.
Representatives of churches and members of parliament questioned the very essence of our democracy. They publicly threatened politicians in a pre-election year, bringing confusion about the democratic process and denouncing our existence as citizens who have rights.
The strength of the backlash despite the time that has passed shows that decriminalisation is only the beginning. It is not the solution or end point in fulfilling human rights, but it serves as a basis for much-needed interventions in social, cultural, institutional and public participation spaces.
How has civil society, and your organisation in particular, responded?
Fighting back has been a slow and protracted process because of limited resources. Botswana’s higher middle income country status and narrow avenues for civil society engagement have meant that the gains made from decriminalisation could not be strategically amplified across the human rights, sexual and reproductive rights and democratic landscape.
Success Capital has less than five per cent of the resources that more prominent civil society organisations have. This means grassroots, hidden and hard-to-reach communities and constituents are left behind – notably in more rural, climate-affected and impoverished areas, where queerness, migrant status, disability, sex work status and being an ethnic minority are all second to socioeconomic status and the need to secure a livelihood.
Our constituents didn’t feel threatened by the anti-LGBTQI+ protests, which is reflective of their resilience and agency. But this was a moment to gauge how unprepared philanthropy is to respond to backlash and regressive attempts. I was shocked when a funder asked me what I was doing about it while knowing full well that they had delayed disbursing funds aimed at removing human rights barriers for LGBTQI+ people.
Still, we commemorated Pride and helped host the Changing Faces Changing Spaces conference organised by the East African Sexual Health and Rights Initiative, for which we helped secure visas and provided advice to LGBTQI+ people and sex workers from across Africa. We worked in solidarity with East African groups in the context of increasing anti-LGBTQI+ sentiments, engaged in strategic policy-oriented dialogue with other civil society leaders, made a solidarity visit to Namibia and networked to ensure that we would be prepared for whatever came next. None of this was externally funded – it was pure feminist decolonial action underpinning our belief in our own freedom, with or without decriminalisation.
Has there been any change in the state of public opinion in Botswana on LGBTQI+ rights?
The Afrobarometer survey has noted some improvements in public opinion, but intolerance and hate speech remain prevalent. National-level data is not always reflective of the situation in local and grassroots communities. Language, socioeconomic status and the availability of services all contribute to how people in Botswana participate and perceive different issues.
For example, in our own community engagements in rural locations we have noted that abortion is mostly accepted on the basis of an understanding of the challenges experienced by many who end up pregnant. However, more than one abortion is frowned upon. And we see similar nuances across sexual orientation, sex characteristics and gender identity issues. For instance, feminine queer men tend to be tolerated more than trans women, as are masculine lesbian women giving birth, while bisexual men are emasculated online. Social parameters are too wide to be readily captured without meaningful resources and political will to ensure all LGBTQI+ people are included in state policy and programming.
Have you experienced any negative repercussions from your work?
Yes. Invitations have been rescinded and scrutiny increased. We are policed on who can be invited to take part in social participation mechanisms that include government officials. We are denied an audience despite fulfilling all the necessary steps in writing invitations, submitting proposals and following up through the hierarchy. For instance, we applied for approval for civil society participation in the 2023 World Bank-International Monetary Fund Spring meetings, and despite receiving permission from parliamentary caucuses, a ministry interrogated us on what we wanted to do and why we wanted to attend.
We had our email address blocked to prevent us submitting future statements to the United Nations. We have been denied funding for being too radical, and calling out funders has not really worked for us.
I’ve had several encounters with law enforcement. The first happened when a fellow volunteer was strangled and I recorded audio of the incident before police confiscated my phone. We are exploring a case on this at the moment. The second happened when a trans colleague was questioned because how she presented was not the same as the gender stated on her identity card. And more recently, we were told of plainclothes police in non-branded cars patrolling and possibly shooting people who don’t stop on highways when instructed to in the middle of nowhere. This kind of policing is harmful, unlawful and abusive, and is being used to target LGBTQI+ people without any accountability.
Where do these restrictions come from?
Some restrictions we’ve faced reflect a regional landscape in which LGBTQI+ networks have shut down, limiting representation, and a global trend in which eligibility, visa and logistical support have only worsened, limiting civil society participation in advocacy and governance mechanisms.
Civil society in Botswana is not immune from these trends. Even within the Global Fund mechanism, the most prominent enabler of those fighting for sexual health rights, delays have taken up most of the current financial year, compromising eight months of service provision.
I think we are underestimating the reach of anti-rights groups. Although global anti-rights influences have existed for decades, domestic counterparts have recently grown emboldened and are increasingly well resourced. Botswana’s higher middle income country status reflects a skewed and unequal income distribution and hides the fact that the few with capital and wealth side with the conservative, morally driven powerholders and are not afraid to deploy their influence against human rights activists. Criminalisation is good business for the politicians that also run corporations. Inequality is good news for those with means and power to subjugate those left behind.
How do you connect with LGBTQI+ rights movements abroad and internationally? What international support do you receive, and what further support do you need?
LGBTQI+ activists are dynamic and diverse. Success Capital has always engaged in collaborative knowledge sharing, linking with other initiatives and sharing the space in advocacy sessions, side events and mobilising actions. We take pride in unearthing young, emergent and nascent activists and movements that operate in the margins and sharing our platform with them. This helps us continue and challenge conversations in rooms we can’t access or engage in.
Since decriminalisation, international support has been quite high. It has, however, been skewed. It has followed a hierarchy that’s reflective of wider trends, with more institutionalised groups having easier access to funding and benefitting from the development industrial complex the most. Grassroots organisations continue to be left behind, lacking institutional or long-term funding.
Solidarity is like sunshine – everyone deserves some. That’s why the ecosystem needs to be steered towards collaboration. And it must focus on strategising so that we don’t merely react to crises and anti-rights action, but we take the initiative in the struggle for our rights.
Civic space in Botswana is rated ‘obstructed’ by theCIVICUS Monitor.
Get in touch with Success Capital through itswebsite orFacebook page, and follow@ProSuccessBW on Twitter.
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CSW66: ‘Grassroots environmental defenders are highly underrepresented in decision-making’
CIVICUS speaks about women’s rights and the United Nations (UN) Commission on the Status of Women (CSW) with Joy Hayley Munthali and Dorothy Kazombo Mwale of the Green Girls Platform.Founded in 2018, the Green Girl Platform is a female-led civil society organisation (CSO) that advocates for climate justice for women and girls in Malawi by building capacity, providing leadership skills and promoting sexual and reproductive health rights.
What are the main women’s rights issues in Malawi, and how does Green Girl Platform work to address them?
In Malawi, women and girls are highly affected by the effects of climate change and environmental degradation due to their role in society. Girls are expected to help fetch firewood and get clean water for their households. Due to the effects of climate change, including erratic rains and depletion of natural resources, women and girls often have to walk long distances to find clean water and firewood. Because of these challenges, most girls are forced into early marriages and some drop out of school.
The vulnerability of women and girls to environmental degradation, as well as to sexual violence and exploitation and gender-related violence, is on the rise. This is happening due to a lack of understanding of the implications of climate change for their lives, lack of information, lack of leadership skills, low participation in governance structures, limited women-led climate-related platforms and a lack of understanding and application of their rights.
Women and girls are left out of decision-making processes although they are the ones who are most affected. The Green Girls Platform was founded to address the violence against women and girls that emanates from climate change and increase the number of women and girls engaged with climate change issues.
The Green Girls Platform is working to ensure that gender and women’s rights are placed on the local, national and global environmental and climate change agendas by advocating for gender-responsive governance and policies. We conduct capacity-building workshops and training on climate change to equip girls with skills and knowledge on climate justice and all it encompasses. Through our initiatives, we have been able to reach around 5,000 young women and girls in Malawi, increasing their active participation in addressing climate change.
What issues did you try to bring into the CSW agenda this year?
As an organisation we noticed that there is underrepresentation of young women and girls in decision-making processes. Their participation and active engagement in climate change governance structures is minimal. Structural changes are needed so that more women are included in decision-making bodies.
Climate change is affecting young women’s access to education, and we need to come up with adaptation strategies that work for girls and young women in their specific contexts. Strategies have to be sustainable and demand-driven to build the adaptive capacity of women and girls and enhance their access to education.
We are aware of the violence that girls and young women environmental defenders face either within their homes or in their communities. We would like to see the adoption of measures to protect the rights of adolescent girls and young women from climate-related violence. Civil society donors could help us navigate these challenges.
What were your expectations, and to what degree were they met?
Our expectations were that our concerns would be listened to and we would collectively come up with solutions to some of the overarching challenges. Although our needs were met to a good degree, we were not highly impressed by the output. But we are positive that things will improve.
In terms of access, we faced some challenges. Only one of our staff was able to attend the CSW sessions in person, and she did so for only three days due to insufficient funding. We also attended some online events, mainly side events, but we had issues accessing main events due to time differences and late notices, and because some of them were not open to civil society.
Do you think that international bodies, and specifically the UN, adequately integrate women in their decision-making processes?
UN Women has taken steps in the right direction in terms of integrating women into decision-making spaces. However, we still have challenges getting all voices represented at the table. Women and girl environmental defenders working at the grassroots level are highly underrepresented in decision-making spaces, even though they are the ones working at the local level and facing the adverse impacts of climate change. Access to climate financing for girls and young women working on climate issues is still minimal and inaccessible, leading to more issues falling through the cracks and not reaching decision makers.
Civic space in Malawi is rated ‘obstructed’ by the CIVICUS Monitor.
Get in touch with the Green Girl Platform through itsFacebook page and follow@GirlsPlatform on Twitter. -
LESOTHO: ‘We must work hand in hand to promote democracy and hold our leaders accountable’
CIVICUS speaks about the 7 October election in Lesotho with Libakiso Matlho, executive director of Women and Law in Southern Africa Research and Education Trust-Lesotho (WLSA). WLSA is a civil society organisation (CSO) based in Southern Africa and working to promote women’s leadership and eradicate gender-based violence. It contributed to the recent election process by providing voter education.
How would you assess the recent election in Lesotho in terms of its transparency and fairness?
Looking at the overall proceedings I would say they were transparent and fair. The Independent Electoral Commission (IEC) did a good job. All candidates were given a platform to share their manifestos as well as their campaigning approaches at different levels, including through the media and public gatherings. Independent candidates did not face any threats. Nobody experienced any restrictions in terms of the exercise of their right to reach out to members of the community and potential voters. Voters were free to attend candidates’ forums and political party rallies.
There were two major challenges, however. One concerned voter civic education, which started a bit later than normal and therefore lasted only about three or four weeks, so it was not as broad as should have been.
The other challenge had to do with the dynamics of the campaign, which was affected by conflict among candidates during public forums. Some participants invited to take part in the discussions also caused chaos. This unfortunately led to a few discussions being cancelled before all the candidates could present their manifestos in some areas, especially those that were marked as hotspots.
Do you foresee any election-related conflict?
It is hard to predict, but this election seems to have been a bit different from others in the past, which makes me wonder.
Around 65 political parties and 2,560 candidates competed in the 7 October election. For a small country with a population of two million, that is a huge number of people. And many might find it difficult to accept the outcome if things do not happen according to their expectations.
The election itself was peaceful, but political tension mounted as votes were counted over the following days. The results were announced on 11 October: the opposition Revolution for Prosperity party came first but was short of a majority, with 56 of 120 seats, while the incumbent All Basotho Convention party (ABC) came second. It is not clear whether ABC will contest the results and its supporters will take to the streets in protest. If this happens, clashes with rival parties might occur and security force repression could follow.
I would not rule conflict out but rather consider it as likely to happen as not.
Do you think the failure to pass constitutional reforms had an impact on the election results?
I think the failure to pass the Omnibus Constitutional Bill, which had been years in the making, probably had a strong impact on the electoral process, and will definitely have an impact on what happens next.
The bill sought to amend key provisions regarding political parties, candidate selection, floor-crossing in parliament, the appointment of senior officials and the role of the prime minister, whose removal would require a two-thirds majority. In May, all major parties in parliament committed to pass the bill by the end of June, but disagreements held it up much longer.
One of the key issues of contention concerned the electoral law, which only allows party leaders to submit a proportional representation party list. With the current system, 80 members of parliament are elected in constituencies and 40 are elected through a proportional division of votes. Small parties are negatively affected because to get some proportional representation seats, they are forced to come together into a list with larger parties, and if they are unable to merge with other parties they are left out.
Another key issue wasthe politicisation of the security sector, which contributes to political instability. The reforms proposed a way to deal with this.
The reforms were eventually passed as parliament was reconvened for an urgent session but, following a series of legal challenges, the Constitutional Court declared them null and void at the last minute before the election.
The failure to pass the reforms will also contribute to continuing difficulties in maintaining coalition governments. Lesotho has had coalition governments since 2012 that have never served a full five-year term due to conflicts that led to their dissolution. In 2017 ABC formed a six-party coalition government, but because of internal conflict Prime Minister Tom Thabane was forced to resign in 2020 and was replaced by Moeketsi Majoro.
Coalitions have not made for stable and effective governments. The coalition-forming process also confuses voters because ideologies are not a big factor when putting them together. This makes voters a bit sceptical that their parties will remain faithful to their mandate.
These were some of the issues the reform was meant to address, but unfortunately they remain unaddressed to this day.
What did voters expect from the election?
One of the expectations voters place on political parties is that they will work on improving service delivery. This includes fixing infrastructure and providing access to water and electricity, among other things. Lesotho also has high rates of unemployment and widespread problems of gender-based violence and femicides, as well as high crime rates that people hope will be addressed by the new government.
Basotho people are not happy with the way the public sector has been managed over the years. Employment is mostly driven by nepotism and political affinities. People are uneasy because political parties on the campaign trail are quick to promise they will fix these things but once in power they fail to deliver.
We have also seen a lot of instability in a key industry, the textile industry, with COVID-19 only making things worse. People were already dealing with bad working conditions and when the pandemic hit many were fired unfairly. This led to worker strikes and has negatively affected foreign investment. Elected leaders need to find means of retaining foreign investment while ensuring good work conditions.
How can the international community support civil society’s work to strengthen democracy in Lesotho?
During the election, civil society faced the challenge that almost all funding for civic education came from the IEC, that is, from the government budget. This could potentially compromise civil society’s watchdog role. Additionally, these funds are never sufficient to allow civil society to conduct its work thoroughly.
The international community should support capacity building so that civil society can conduct robust advocacy during and after the election period. Collaboration between international and local CSOs is also important. For the recent election local CSOs took on voter education alone, without any involvement by international CSOs. We must work hand in hand to promote democracy in our countries and hold our leaders accountable.
Civic space in Lesotho is rated ‘obstructed’ by theCIVICUS Monitor.
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MALAWI: ‘The tactics used by the current administration are the same used by its predecessors’
CIVICUS speaks about recent protests in Malawi with Michael Kaiyatsa, Executive Director of the Centre for Human Rights and Rehabilitation (CHRR).CHRR is civil society organisation (CSO) aimed at supporting and promoting democracy and human rights in Malawi. Its mission is to contribute towards the protection, promotion and consolidation of good governance by empowering rural and urban communities to exercise their rights. Founded in 1995 by former student exiles who returned home to the promise of a new democracy, it operates through two core programmes: Community Mobilisation and Empowerment and Human Rights Monitoring and Training.
How has the situation in Malawi evolved since the 2020 elections?
Malawi held a presidential election in June 2020 because the 2019 election was annulled on the basis that there were massive irregularities and the court ordered a rerun. The 2020 election was won by the opposition candidate, Lazarus Chakwera.
During the campaign, Chakwera said that if elected, he would address some key issues, including corruption in the public sector. It was the perception of public opinion that corruption was on the rise and the previous administration had not done much to tackle the problem. Chakwera promised to introduce reforms to seal all loopholes allowing for corruption and to improve the judicial system so corruption cases would not be ignored.
However, once in power it didn’t look like these changes were effectively being implemented. As usual, the first year people gave the new administration some time. The president kept on making the same promises but made very little actual progress.
The second year continued in the same way and Malawians started to lose patience. People started to take their discontent out to the streets. The economic situation in Malawi also kept getting worse, with costs of living skyrocketing every day and a rise in unemployment. People looked back at campaign promises and compared them to their reality, and frustration arose.
I wouldn’t say all campaign commitments were just empty promises and lies, because there were issues the government attempted to address, but progress has been slow. For instance, they promised to increase funding for the Anti-Corruption Bureau (ACB) and ensure its independence. Funding for the ACB increased significantly, and a new law was eventually passed to amend the Corrupt Practices Act, removing the requirement of the ACB director to seek consent to prosecute corruption cases. They promised to set up special courts to prosecute corruption cases, and finally submitted a bill to amend the Court’s Act and make a provision for special courts.
But they also promised to work to recover stolen assets and are moving at an extremely slow pace in this regard. And they also said they would create a million jobs for young people, which has never happened.
What’s behind recent protests against the judiciary?
Last year we started seeing lots of protests against corruption and impunity. There have been numerous cases involving government officials – including from the current administration – that have not been prosecuted. Investigations take years, and those involving senior government officials take the longest and rarely end in conviction. Recent ACB reports show that only 30 per cent of such cases have been concluded, and most of these date back to 2015.
In sum, the wheels of justice are barely moving, and people have concluded that the government is pursuing selective justice. In a recent case, for instance, an 18-year-old man arrested for cannabis possession was prosecuted and given a sentence of eight years in prison, while people accused of serious crimes involving corruption are given three and four-year sentences, if anything at all. Ironically, before this case, a powerful business leader was accused of the same crime, marijuana possession, and was just asked to pay a fine. Such arbitrariness is pushing people to the streets.
While selective justice is nothing new, this time around people want to hold the government accountable for the promises made on the campaign trail. As a result, pressure is also coming from the opposition to hold the government to account. When the current ruling party was in the opposition, they were the ones raising these issues. Now people are realising it is not any different from its predecessors.
How have the authorities responded to the protests?
The government has often tried to stop protests with the use of excessive force. Just recently, over 80 activists were detained and arrested. They were charged with holding an illegal assembly, although the constitution guarantees the freedom of assembly. Hours before these demonstrations started, some Malawians claiming to be from the business community requested the court issue an injunction to stop them. The injunction was granted late in the afternoon, so people gathered the next morning without knowing about it, and the police came in and started firing teargas, beating up people and arresting everyone they could.
The tactics used by the current administration are the same ones used by its predecessors. The habit of getting last-minute injunctions isn’t new at all: this is what happened in July 2011, when the government got a last-minute injunction, people assembled without any knowledge of it and over 20 were killed by the police in the ensuing repression.
What shocks me the most is the court’s interpretation of the meaning of the right to the freedom of assembly. The Police Act is very clear about what needs to be done if people stage a protest. It all starts with a notification to the authorities, but this is usually interpreted as people needing to obtain permission from the police, which is against what the law actually says.
In the recent protest against the judiciary, we were told the demonstration would not proceed until the organisers provided a list with the protesters’ names, to be held liable if the demonstration resulted in damage to property. This is strange, as you cannot be sure who is going to attend a protest and how they will conduct themselves. It is not just the police but also the courts that are now asking for a registry of attendees, something that cannot be found anywhere in the law.
How could the international community support Malawian civil society?
Over the past two or three years, new civil society groups have emerged to defend human rights and economic justice, and are mobilising mostly through social media platforms and community radio, particularly in rural areas, issuing statements and calling people to the streets.
Malawian civil society needs international protection. We need to be able to express ourselves and feel safe while doing it, so we need our international partners to send a message to the president, reminding him of his commitments and his obligations under the constitution.
We continue to experience the same challenges as in the past, despite the administration being a beneficiary of civil society mobilisation. In 2019 and 2020, when organisations like ours were protesting against electoral irregularities, the current authorities were by our side and supported our protest for democracy. But they are now doing exactly what they criticised when they were in the opposition, including by passing laws that restrict civil society, such as the recent NGO Amendment Act.
Civil society also needs resources, including for legal representation. There are currently over 80 civil society activists under arrest, most of whom don’t have legal representation. As a result, they remain in custody awaiting trial. There’s no fair access to justice and they could be held indefinitely.
Civic space in Malawi is rated ‘obstructed’ by theCIVICUS Monitor.
Get in touch with the Centre for Human Rights and Rehabilitation through itswebsite orFacebook page, and follow@CHRRMalawi on Twitter. -
MOZAMBIQUE: ‘The new NGO Law will be the death of the civic movement’
CIVICUS discusses the state of civic space and new restrictions being imposed on civil society in Mozambique with Paula Monjane, Executive Director of the Civil Society Learning and Capacity Building Centre (CESC).
CESC is a non-partisan, non-profit civil society organisation (CSO) founded in 2009 with the mission of strengthening the capacity of citizens and communities to participate actively in socio-economic and political development processes, investing in knowledge sharing, learning tools, monitoring and advocacy for public policies that respond to people’s needs.
What are the current conditions for civil society in Mozambique?
The legal, political, institutional and practical conditions under which civil society operates in Mozambique have deteriorated over time. Over the past 10 to 15 years, despite having a constitution and laws that safeguard and recognise fundamental universal rights, we have witnessed increasing curtailment of freedoms of expression and information, press freedom and freedoms of assembly and public participation. This curtailment has been practised in violation of both the Constitution of the Republic of Mozambique and the global and African human rights instruments Mozambique has signed. Currently, legislation is being proposed to silence dissenting voices and people fighting for better governance of public affairs and the protection of human rights.
Freedom of the press and expression has been marked by intimidation, kidnappings and disappearances of journalists, illegal detentions and physical violence, including killings perpetrated with impunity, mainly by police officers and other security forces. In 2021 alone, the Media Institute of Southern Africa (MISA) recorded 23 cases of violations.
In addition to these actions, there have been legislative onslaughts to limit press freedoms. In 2018, Decree 40/2018 introduced inexplicably high taxes for the licensing and registration of media companies and the accreditation of national and foreign press correspondents. In 2020 the decree was repealed due to pressure by MISA and the fact that the Constitutional Council declared it unconstitutional. But in December 2021, the government introduced a bill on media and broadcasting that would further restrict the exercise of press freedoms.
Attempts to deny permission for peaceful protests and control and suppress them have also increased. In 2022, several peaceful protests organised by feminist activists that had been notified to the relevant institutions were interfered with. In many cases activists were rounded up at police stations for no clear reason. People defending human rights have suffered reprisals, ranging from verbal and bodily threats to murder.
Elections, which have never been free or fair, have been the scene of systematic fraud, with violence committed before, during and after voting, and impunity for the state agents involved in it.
Spaces for people’s participation, which became popular in the 2000s, have been losing steam in the face of an increasingly closed political regime. People’s participation in state planning has become dependent on the will of the state official who oversees the area and the locality in question. In addition, we are witnessing a rise in controls imposed on CSOs that scrutinise the government in the areas of democracy, governance and human rights and threats they will be ‘blacklisted’.
Other restrictive measures have included changes introduced in the Criminal Code in 2014, defining defamation of senior state officials as a crime against state security and the approval of the 2022 Anti-Money Laundering and Terrorist Financing Act, which overregulates CSOs.
Under the pretext of fighting terrorism, yet another proposal that restricts a fundamental right, that of freedom of association, was approved by the Council of Ministers in September 2022 and sent to the Assembly of the Republic, Mozambique’s parliament, for approval in October.
How will this new law affect CSOs in Mozambique?
The draft law establishes a legal regime for the creation, organisation and functioning of CSOs and contains several norms that violate freedom of association, despite this right being safeguarded by the constitution and international human rights treaties. It gives the government absolute and discretionary powers to ‘create’, control the functioning of, suspend and extinguish CSOs.
If the bill is approved, it will legitimise already existing practices restricting civic space, allowing the persecution of dissenting voices and organisations critical of the government, up to banning them from continuing to operate. It will be the death of the civic movement, as only organisations aligned to the ruling party will survive. Party leagues affiliated with opposition political parties and opposition political parties themselves may be at risk of extinction.
Among other things, if passed, the new law would require that statutory changes that involve changes in objectives, activities or even the name of a CSO be approved by the regulatory body, without imposing any deadline for it to issue a decision. It would impose a single template for the bylaws of all CSOs, including details on authorities, mandates, forms of operation, reporting and members’ rights, easily allowing for the criminalisation of their leaders. It would reverse the burden of proof: CSOs will have to prove they are fulfilling their objectives and functioning properly through an annual report submitted every first quarter, and will risk suspension or termination if they fail to submit two reports. This law is intrusive in an area regulated by private law as established by the constitution and also ignores the variety of associations that exist in Mozambique. In addition, it gives the government the authority to conduct monitoring visits, audit accounts, visit implementation sites, demand periodic reports and request additional documentation whenever it sees fit.
Under the guise of preventing money laundering and terrorism financing, the draft law treats CSOs as criminals from the get-go. It is also unclear how these excessive controls could actually result in greater success in the fight against terrorism financing.
Why is the Mozambican government regulating CSOs as part of the fight against money laundering and terrorism financing?
The argument that this law aims to combat money laundering does not hold up, first of all because another law was passed in July 2022, law 11/2022, which deals specifically with money laundering and terrorism financing. CSOs must comply with it and it contains a specific article dedicated to them.
Out of the 40 recommendations issued by the Financial Action Task Force (FATF) for states to adopt in the fight against money laundering and terrorism financing, only one – recommendation 8 – pertains to CSOs, and focuses on the possible need to adapt the legal framework based on risk assessment, in order to identify the sub-sector at risk, understand possible risks and develop adequate measures for mitigation and supervision based on and proportional to risk.
Additionally, the FATF has attached an extensive interpretative note to recommendation 8 and has produced a report on best practices, which mentions the need to respect international human rights law, indicates that measures should not disrupt or discourage legitimate charitable activities and notes that actions taken against non-profit organisations suspected of engaging in terrorism financing should minimise the negative impact on the innocent and legitimate beneficiaries of their services.
In October 2022, Mozambique was put on the FATF grey list, but the only action it needed to take in relation to CSOs was to conduct a terrorism financing risk assessment in line with FATF standards and use this as the basis for developing a disclosure plan. These recommendations are also in line with the assessment conducted in 2021 by the East and Southern Africa Anti-Money Laundering Group, the FATF’s regional partner organisation for East and Southern Africa. But instead, the Mozambican government has presented parliament with a bill to restrict the work of CSOs. The question then is, what are its real intentions?
The Mozambican government is not alone in attempting to pass an anti-civic space law. Several African states are using FATF recommendations and international pressure as an excuse to legitimise breaches of international and regional human rights instruments and their constitutions, relying on the indifference and sometimes even the protection of some bodies that should be defending these rights.
Over the past two decades, in a context of democratic regression and a growing prevalence of authoritarian governments, the African continent has seen many laws and measures passed or proposed that restrict universal rights and civic space. According to Freedom House’s 2022 report, 24 African countries have attempted to pass anti-civil society measures and laws. Twelve have succeeded in passing them, six have failed or given up and six have initiatives pending, including Mozambique.
How is civil society responding?
Soon after the surprise approval of the draft NGO law, national, provincial and district CSOs came together in what is now a movement fighting for the right to freedom of association. Aware that this process is not merely technical, but mainly political, we embraced multiple tactics, from lobbying and advocacy with decision makers in government, parliament and national and international human rights institutions to campaigns to deepen people’s understanding of the implications of this law’s approval.
We also conducted several technical analyses and promoted national and international debates. After many efforts and difficulties, we were able to hold a two-day meeting with relevant parliamentary working committees in November 2022. This resulted in the important decision that there was need for a broad consultation with citizens and social organisations at the national level, as universal and fundamental rights are at stake. Consultations were held in all 10 provinces between 6 and 16 February 2023, organised by the Assembly of the Republic alongside the Movement of CSOs In Defence of the Right and Freedom of Association, and included the participation of over 600 CSOs that were unanimous in rejecting the draft law.
Despite these important steps, we remain concerned about the link made between the urgency to approve the law and Mozambique’s removal from the FATF grey list. This means that even if it does not correspond to what is required of Mozambique, parliament will approve the law as soon as it resumes work next March. Given the defects of the draft law, we think the time is too short for a proper revision that ensures it doesn’t violate the fundamental and universal right to freedom of association.
If it is passed, we will push for it to be declared unconstitutional. We also expect more visible action from international and regional bodies, including CSOs. Given the dimension of the problem, in Mozambique as in the continent, and because it falls under their mandates, we expect urgent condemnation from the African Union, through the African Commission on Human and Peoples’ Rights, and from the United Nations, through the Special Rapporteur on the rights to freedom of peaceful assembly and of association and the Special Rapporteur on counterterrorism and human rights.
On behalf of CSOs fighting for human rights and democracy, we hope that the solidarity already shown will continue and that we will join efforts to push back against anti-civic space initiatives such as this.
Civic space in Mozambique is rated ‘repressed’ by theCIVICUS Monitor.
Get in touch with CESC through itswebsite or itsFacebook page, and follow@CescMoz on Twitter.
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NAMIBIA: ‘There is only so much civil society can do when those in power support extractive companies’
CIVICUS speaks with Rinaani Musutua of the Economic and Social Justice Trust (ESJT) about thee resistance of communities in the Okavango River Basin in Southern Africa against oil and gas exploration by the Canadian company ReconAfrica.Founded in 2012, ESJT is a civil society organisation (CSO) that promotes social and economicr ights in Namibia and has been part of the coalition mobilising against ReconAfrica’s extractivep roject.
What are your concerns regarding ReconAfrica’s operations in the Okavango River Basin?
The Okavango River Basin, known in Namibia as the Kavango, flows from Angola through northern Namibia and empties out into the Okavango Delta in northwest Botswana. We first heard that ReconAfrica, an oil and gas company headquartered in Canada, had a petroleum exploration licence there in 2020. We were never informed when it sought and obtained its exploration licence and environmental clearance certificate. We looked it up and found it strange that the company received its environmental clearance certificate on a public holiday in Namibia. This makes us wonder who authorised its operations.
Communities in the Kavango region have never been consulted by ReconAfrica. This is worrying because, according to the law, to get to their environmental and clearance certificate companies must first consult with the people who live in the places they wish to operate in. But locals were never informed about the pros and cons of the project and had no idea what the project was about. Only recently did ReconAfrica hold one meeting with community members, after we complained. But even after this meeting, community members were confused about the project because the information provided wasn’t detailed or clear enough.
ReconAfrica decided to apply for land rights after civil society activists and organisations started questioning its legitimacy to operate and occupy land in the region. Prior to this it claimed to have received permission from traditional chiefs, but when media and activists approached them, the chiefs denied it. As it stands, the company is illegally occupying communal land and should be charged for it, but the government doesn’t seem to care.
How will local communities be affected if the project goes ahead?
The Kavango region is home to many communities, including the Indigenous San, who make their living from farming and fishing, and many more that rely on the water that flows from the Okavango Delta. ReconAfrica’s activities threatens the habitat of several wildlife species and could potentially contaminate the water people and animals depend on.
ReconAfrica has been drilling very close to the Omatako River, which is ephemeral due to the low average annual rainfall. It looks like there is not activity, but scientists have confirmed there is activity underneath the river.
When the company was conducting its seismic surveys, many local communities complained that their homes and croplands were damaged due to negligence by drivers. When people complained, ReconAfrica used local people to manipulate community members into signing papers without explaining the content. It was later found that the signed papers gave the company the right to pass through their crops and because of this those affected haven’t been compensated for their loss.
Unfortunately, works continue because our government supports the company. There is only so much civil society can do when those in power support extractive companies at the expense of local communities.
How is civil society mobilising against oil and gas exploration and drilling in the Kavango region?
As civil society we have held public meetings to inform people about the potential danger of this project. ESJT teamed up with other Namibian CSOs to petition the government to halt ReconAfrica’s activities immediately. The Parliamentary Standing Committee on Natural Resources Parliamentary Standing Committee on Natural Resources conducted an investigation but didn’t do such a good job because it failed to go to affected areas. Most of its meetings were held in town and people from the affected areas weren’t able to attend because they don’t have resources to travel to town.
We have also written a lot of newspaper articles highlighting the dangers of ReconAfrica’s activity.
Since we are not able hold public meetings all over Namibia, we are hopeful that these articles will reach people so they can stay informed.
Together with other local and international CSOs we have released a joint statement calling on the Namibian government to examine the oil and gas exploration activities taking place in the Kavango region. We have also complained about ReconAfrica to the Canadian authorities authorities, who started investigating the company. What was disappointing, however, is that it did not investigate ReconAfrica’s environmental and human rights violations in the Kavango region, but only its potentially fraudulent stock market business.
Unfortunately, it seems like our demands are falling on deaf ears. People have accused us of being against development. This makes it difficult for us to unite against ReconAfrica and the government, because they know we don’t have everyone’s full support.
What kind of support from international civil society and the wider international community would help the movement?
Fortunately,international organisations such as Re:wild have expressed support for our fight and brought awareness to what is going on in the Kavango region. Prince Harry Harry has also shown support for our fight against ReconAfrica and its activities.
But beyond international support, we still need people in the Kavango region to also stand up and speak against this project. Right now, most people organising the resistance are based in Windhoek, Namibia’s capital. People in the Kavango region should mobilise so the government can see this is an urgent matter that affects them. We need resources to continue delivering workshops to inform people about the dangers of this project. Our work is limited because we aren’t adequately equipped.
Get in touch with Economic and Social Justice Trust through its website or its Facebook page,and follow @esjtnam on Twitter.
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NAMIBIA: ‘We have seen some progress on LGBTQI+ rights, but there is a lot of work still to be done’
CIVICUS speaks about recent moves to ban same-sex marriage in Namibia with Kevin Wessels, a young activist and a seasoned consultant and social entrepreneur working to advance human rights in Namibia.Kevin works with several Namibian LGBTQI+ rights organisations, driven by a vision of a just society where everyone, including LGBTQI+ people, enjoys equal rights and opportunities. To that end, he connects with like-minded people and organisations in Namibia, across Africa and around the world.
Namibia has a reputation for being a democratic country with relatively open civic space. Do LGBTQI+ people enjoy the same freedoms as everyone else?
Despite Namibia being a democratic country where civic freedoms are mostly respected, the situation of LGBTQI+ people is mixed: it is better than in many other countries in the region, but legal and social discrimination persist. Namibia has seen some progress on LGBTQI+ rights, such as the recognition of gender identity.
Most recently, in May 2023, Namibia’s Supreme Court ruled that the government must recognise the unions of same-sex couples who married in countries where it was legal for them to do so, even though same-sex marriage remains illegal in Namibia itself. The ruling, which drew mixed reactions in a country that’s socially conservative, was in sharp contrast to developments in Uganda, where one of the world’s most draconian anti-LGBTQI+ laws has been passed.
But Namibian LGBTQI+ people continue to face numerous challenges, so there is a lot of work still to be done.
First and foremost, there is the matter of legal status: same-sex sexual activity remains prohibited under the common law, which Namibia inherited when it gained independence from South Africa in 1990. Although South Africa decriminalised same-sex sexual activity, Namibia has not.
The law criminalises acts of ‘sodomy’ and is applied only to men. While punishment for this offence is not clear, there is evidence of the law being enforced, with over 100 reported cases resulting in more than 50 arrests since 2003. However, consensual sodomy has seldom been prosecuted, so the provision appears to be largely obsolete. Nevertheless, its mere existence is a violation of human rights and underpins further acts of discrimination, and is inconsistent with Namibia’s constitution, which provides for equality and non-discrimination.
LGBTQI+ people in Namibia continue to face discrimination, harassment and stigma, both in society and in their families. This often results in challenges in accessing healthcare, education and employment opportunities.
Key issues on the Namibian LGBTQI+ rights movement’s agenda include decriminalisation of same-sex relations and the establishment of stronger legal protections against discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity, equal access to healthcare, including gender-affirming care, educational initiatives and awareness campaigns to increase understanding of LGBTQI+ issues and acceptance of LGBTQI+ people, and firm policies to address hate crimes and violence against LGBTQI+ people.
How are Namibian LGBTQI+ organisations working to promote LGBTQI+ rights?
There are several active LGBTQI+ advocacy groups in Namibia, including Equal Rights Namibia, Drag Night Namibia, Out-Right Namibia and the Namibian Transgender Movement, among others. I am directly associated with several of these. We focus on raising awareness, advocating for legal reforms and supporting LGBTQI+ people.
LGBTQI+ organisations seek to influence policymakers to achieve legal reforms and protections against discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity. Some have pursued legal cases to challenge discriminatory practices and establish legal precedents for LGBTQI+ rights in Namibia.
LGBTQI+ groups also conduct educational campaigns and workshops to raise awareness and promote understanding of LGBTQI+ issues among society as a whole. They foster visibility and create community by holding parades and festivals during Pride Week celebrations. They provide support, counselling and resources to LGBTQI+ people facing discrimination, mental health challenges or other issues related to their identity. They create safe and inclusive spaces for LGBTQI+ people to connect and share experiences.
Building a supportive community is a fundamental aspect of this work, and so is the celebration of our achievements. LGBTQI+ organisations celebrate milestones and achievements in the fight for equal rights, such as our recent legal victory, successful awareness campaigns and the establishment of new support networks and safe spaces. We are most proud of the progress we have made in gaining legal and societal acceptance of LGBTQI+ rights and people.
Have you faced backlash for the work you do?
Yes, I have! People and organisations advocating for LGBTQI+ rights in Namibia, as in many parts of the world, often face backlash as a direct result of their advocacy work. This may come in various forms, including discrimination and social stigma, particularly within communities, harassment or threats to personal safety, legal challenges or restrictions and resistance from conservative anti-rights groups that may present legal challenges, disrupt activities, issue statements publicly questioning LGBTQI+ rights and stoke social opposition.
Despite these challenges, many LGBTQI+ activists and organisations in Namibia and around the world continue to work tirelessly to promote equal rights and acceptance for LGBTQI+ people. We exhibit resilience, determination and a commitment to creating a more inclusive and accepting society.
Do you see the anti-rights reaction in Namibia as part of a regional or global trend?
There are domestic, regional and global factors at play. While anti-LGBTQI+ groups across countries tend to raise the same themes and use a shared set of tactics, the level of opposition and the specific issues can differ according to the cultural, religious and political context. Some regions may experience more organised and coordinated anti-rights efforts, while others may face a less centralised opposition. Anti-rights groups often have international connections and support, sharing strategies and resources across borders, although the extent of this coordination can vary widely.
In other words, it’s important to recognise that LGBTQI+ rights movements and their opponents exist on a spectrum, and there is a diversity of views within societies. And while there may be pockets of strong opposition, there are also many people and organisations globally working to promote LGBTQI+ rights and equality. Efforts to advance LGBTQI+ rights often involve engaging in open dialogue, education and advocacy to address misconceptions and promote understanding among these different segments of society.
What triggered the recent initiative to ban same-sex marriage in Namibia? How have LGBTQI+ groups and other human rights organisations reacted, and what are the next steps in this struggle?
In July 2023, the National Council, Namibia’s upper house of parliament, passed a law banning same-sex marriage and punishing its supporters. The bill was aimed at countering the recent Supreme Court ruling that authorised the recognition of certain same-sex unions contracted abroad. Its proponents stated that its purpose was to ensure respect for the definition of marriage as between a man and a woman. The text of the bill defines marriage as a union between persons of opposite sexes and defines a spouse as ‘half of a legal union between two persons born genetically male and female’. It states that marriages concluded abroad between two persons of the same sex cannot be recognised in Namibia and makes the solemnisation, participation in, promotion or advertisement of such a marriage a criminal offence punishable with up to six years in prison and fines up to NAD 100,000 (approx. US$5,200).
This is the fastest a law has been passed in Namibia. It was adopted by the National Council without any opposition, and the National Assembly, parliament’s lower house, also quickly endorsed it. However, it still needs to be promulgated by the president to come into force. The LGBTQI+ community has condemned it as an unconstitutional attack on our rights, but there is nothing we can do to stop the president from signing it into law. We will have to contest it in court for it to be deemed unconstitutional.
What kind of support do Namibian LGBTQI+ organisations receive from international partners, and what further support is needed?
Namibian LGBTQI+ organisations are well connected with international movements for LGBTQI+ rights. We often participate in international conferences, workshops and events to share experiences, strategise together and exchange information, research and best practices to enhance advocacy efforts. Global spaces also give additional visibility to our efforts. As part of its awareness campaigns, for instance, Drag Night Namibia, one of the organisations I collaborate with, recently staged a performance in Berlin, Germany.
International movements help raise awareness about LGBTQI+ issues in countries where there may be limited local support. They show solidarity by condemning human rights violations. In this context, various Namibian LGBTQI+ organisations have condemned the Ugandan government’s laws and actions against LGBTQI+ people.
Additionally, international partners may from time to time provide financial support to Namibian LGBTQI+ organisations in the form of grants or donations to help us carry out our work effectively. But we still need a lot of further support, not just financial but also in terms of the provision of platforms for advocacy and visibility.
Civic space in Namibia is rated ‘narrowed’ by theCIVICUS Monitor.
Get in touch with Kevin at and follow@wessels_nam on Twitter andwessels_official on Instagram.
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SOUTH AFRICA: ‘We want to live in an environment that respects women and recognises our human rights’
As part of the #16DaysOfActivism campaign, CIVICUS speaks with Amanda Nomnqa about civil society efforts to eradicate gender-based violence (GBV) in South Africa.
Amanda is the founder of SheIsBrave, a South African civil society organisation that provides mentorship and empowers young girls and women to gain independence and overcome GBV.
The 16 Days of Activism against Gender-Based Violence is an annual international campaign that kicks off on 25 November, the International Day for the Elimination of Violence against Women, and runs until 10 December, Human Rights Day.
How big a problem is GBV South Africa?
GBV is the worst pandemic South Africa continues to face. The country exhibits very high rates of GBV that affect not only women but also children and LGBTQI+ people. The social, political and economic situation so many of them live in exposes them to GBV. This violence has robbed many of their lives, freedom, dignity and more. It is a human rights violation that has a huge impact on the social and development progression of survivors.
The criminal justice system doesn’t support victims and survivors. The national police systematically fails to help them: it doesn’t channel enough resources to help victims, and the available resources are misused due to lack of expertise in using them. Analysing DNA takes them too long and many police officers don’t know how to use a rape kit properly. All this perpetuates GBV and makes the fight against it even more difficult. And there is no political will to implement measures and policies to tackle the problem.
What work does your organisation do?
SheIsBrave is an organisation led by womxn and young people founded and registered in 2018, seeking to empower girls and young women by providing formal and non-formal skills so they can successfully compete in the job market and become independent. Most GBV victims become hopeless and we want to make sure they still feel valuable, can acquire skills and can use them to improve their lives. We want them to have access to socio-economic opportunities so they can overcome situations of GBV and escape their damaging consequences.
We also support survivors by helping them get counselling. Getting professional help is very important for mental wellbeing so we want to provide that kind of help.
We also have programmes for young girls and children to teach them about GBV. We provide activities for them to work on their talents and allow them a space to express themselves. Our aim is to show them that certain situations are not normal and are wrong, and empower them so they are confident enough to speak up if they are facing such situations. We also try to equip them so they can carry on the same kind of advocacy work in the future.
We also mobilise in protest to make noise and draw attention to the scourge of GBV in our communities so that those in power finally do something about it.
What challenges do you face?
Our main challenge is the lack of financial and material resources to work with our target communities. Lack of funding has limited the scope of our work because we are forced to focus mostly on zero-budget activities. We depend on fundraising and sometimes have to contribute funds from our own pockets.
There aren’t enough funds in place to support civil society in South Africa, and most of what’s available doesn’t reach the organisations doing the work due to mismanagement and corruption. During the pandemic we saw a rise in GBV cases but the government failed to provide enough funding for shelters, medical help and legal aid to victims and survivors. Lack of government funding affected most organisations that provide support to victims. Unfortunately, this is what most organisations including ours are still going through. Organisational growth has really been limited as a result.
What will you be doing for the 16 Days of Activism campaign?
This year we will be working on the ground. We are hosting public meetings with activists working on the same issues as us. We want to bring awareness about GBV in general and femicide in particular. SheIsBrave is based in a community that considered one of the top three biggest hotspots for GBV in South Africa. So we are taking advantage of this opportunity to share information among community members on how people experiencing abuse can report cases, seek medical attention and access shelters.
We hope that as a result more people will know what to do if they need help. We want them to know that help is available and they should never shy away from reaching out.
We also hope our work will inspire other organisations working on these issues to reach out so we can collaborate in the future. If we speak in one voice, we will be more consistent and more powerful and we stand a better chance of making the government and other stakeholders see that they must urgently address the problem.
We are aware that on this date many other organisations are mobilising to push the government to enact better laws and implement better policies to address GBV and we hope this year our voices will be heard. We want to live in an environment that respects women and recognises our human rights. Our government should commit to helping us in our struggle.
Civic space in the South Africais rated ‘obstructed’ by theCIVICUS Monitor
Get in touch with SheIsBrave through itswebsite or itsFacebook andInstagram pages, and follow@sheisbrave_za on Twitter.
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SOUTH AFRICA: ‘We were denied the right to give or refuse our consent, so we took Shell to court – and won’
CIVICUS speaks about civil society’s recent court victory against Shell in South Africa with Sinegugu Zukulu, programme manager of Sustaining the Wild Coast (SWC). SWC is a South African civil society organisation that works with coastal communities of Eastern Mpondoland, South Africa, to protect their land, livelihoods and culture. What inspired you to become an environmental activist?
My personal story made me become an environmental activist. I grew up on communal land, where people shared everything and people could depend on each other. People in my community had little education. I was one of the few lucky ones who were able to attend university. However, people were good at sharing. They practised ubuntu, a concept that refers to our shared humanity and the way we see our humanity reflected in each other. Among us everything is shared, from the water we drink to the land where we grow our crops.
The fact that I grew up in a community where we all took care of each other and shared everything made me who I am. As I got an education while most didn’t, I found I could use it to give back to my community. Because people in communities like mine were so poorly educated, governments could do whatever they wanted. So I decided to step up for my people and help them understand their rights and protect themselves.
It was only natural for me to focus on environmental rights, as I got my degree in environmental studies. When the government started a project to build a highway cutting through my community, I brought a case to the High Court. Unfortunately, this was not successful and we are now renegotiating to have the road rerouted.
Why is it important to protect South Africa’s Wild Coast?
All our coastal communities rely on the Wild Coast for their livelihoods. For most coastal communities, the Wild Coast is also their source of income: they sustainably profit from the environment, for instance by catching fish and selling it in villages and to tourists. The tourism industry employs many people, so this is another way in which people depend on the coastline.
Additionally, the Wild Coast holds spiritual meaning. People training to become traditional healers go to the coast to get in contact with their ancestors. We believe the ocean is our final resting place, so our ancestors lay there. Saltwater is used in most healing practices.
Due to the number and diversity of its marine species, the Wild Coast is also a marine protected area. The extraction of fossil fuel has the potential to destroy it, on top of contributing to climate change when it’s burned. So we should also protect the Wild Coast from extraction for the sake of the Earth.
What challenges did you face when campaigning against Shell?
Just like any other government, South Africa’s wants to attract investment, particularly by multinational corporations such as Shell, with which it has a great relationship. That’s why our court case set us not just against Shell but also against our government.
A big challenge was the government’s delegitimising narrative. The Ministry of Mineral Resources and Energy labelled us as ‘anti-development’. The government refused to listen to us and to have an open dialogue about Shell’s potentially negative impact on coastal communities.
We wanted to have Shell’s exploration permit revoked because we saw it as a threat to our livelihood and to a safe environment. You just need to google what happened with Shell in Ogoniland in Nigeria and you will understand our concerns. We don’t want an oil spill on our coasts.
South Africa has good environmental legislation, but much of it is lacking in implementation, so that is what the environmental movement focuses on. The law is very clear; our constitution says we have the right to a safe and healthy environment. If someone wants to do something on our land, we should be consulted, and we weren’t. We were denied the right to give or refuse our consent, so we took Shell to court – and won.
South African civil society enjoys the freedoms needed to challenge the government in court. But financial resources were critical. We had no money to travel to communities and mobilise them, so we did all our mobilisation work through social media, where we provided information, published press releases and shared videos. We had to look for a law firm that was able and willing to take this matter to court, and that would agree to take the risk even if there were not enough financial resources. Fortunately, we were able to find several legal firms that were willing to come to our rescue. These are firms that prioritise human rights issues and support litigation by Indigenous communities, and fortunately the judges required Shell and our government to pay our litigation costs.
What does this victory mean for South Africa and the environmental movement?
This victory means a lot in terms of our right to self-determination as guaranteed by the United Nations, as it made it clear that free, prior and informed consent must always be sought. It also ratified our constitutional right to a safe and healthy environment.
It is a victory not just for us but also for future generations. We are working so that their right to a safe and healthy environment will also be protected.
We are now working on a documentary about our struggle, which we plan to launch at the upcoming conference of the parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (COP27) in Egypt, although we lack the resources to travel there. We would love to inspire Indigenous communities elsewhere to also rise up and defend their territories. By doing so we will be ensuring life on this planet continues to be possible.
What kind of support do South African environmental activists need from the international community?
The most important thing we need right now are financial resources to continue doing our work.
We also need international partners and support. Shell is a British company, but the UK government has no problem with it going around the world searching for more fossil fuels, in the middle of a climate crisis. These first-world multinational companies are going to third-world countries to extract ever more profit at the cost of compromising our livelihoods and worsening climate change. As always, the real victims are the poorest people.
This has got to stop. Organisations from the countries where these companies come from should work with us and pressure them to stop. Corporations should move to safer energy sources; fossil fuels are not the answer anymore.
Civic space in South Africa is rated ‘obstructed’ by the CIVICUS Monitor.
Get in touch with Sustaining the Wild Coast through its website or Facebook page.
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ZAMBIA: ‘Our aim is to break societal biases against girls’
CIVICUS speaks about the upcoming International Women’s Day and Zambian civil society’s role in advancing women’s and girls’ rights with Pamela Mateyo andMwape Kapepula, co-founders of WingEd Girls.
Founded in 2021, WingEd Girls is a civil society organisation (CSO) focused on distributing sanitary materials and teaching girls in underprivileged communities how to make reusable pads, while educating them on personal and menstrual hygiene and mentoring them through post school career paths and choices.
How has the COVID-19 pandemic impacted on Zambian women and girls?
The restrictions that the pandemic brought, confining people in their homes, greatly contributed to a rise in domestic and gender-based violence (GBV). Compared to 2019, the cases reported in 2020 increased by over 1,000 cases, affecting mostly women and children.
The pandemic also led to many businesses closing. Many of those were informal businesses dedicated to planning events or catering, thrift clothes shops, restaurants and marketplace stalls. Many were owned and run by women. As a result, households led by women were left in a very vulnerable position, often unable to access basic needs.
At the start of the pandemic schools closed, leading to an increase in rape cases of girls staying at home. By the time schools reopened, many girls couldn’t go back because they were either pregnant or getting married, while others simply dropped out. In addition, focus on COVID-19 reduced access by women and girls to basic healthcare, including maternal care, HIV treatment and sexual and reproductive health care.
How have civil society in general, and WingEd Girls in particular, responded to this situation?
CSOs like World Vision worked in partnership with the government to ensure that while schools were closed children were still engaged in schoolwork, for instance by sponsoring radio and television programmes that taught children basic subjects.
We founded WingEd Girls in the middle of the pandemic to respond to very urgent needs. But this also brought many challenges. The work we do depends on interaction with girls. However, as the number of people that could gather was restricted, it was very hard to reach out to schools and communities. To be able to do our work, we secured bigger spaces and engaged more peer educators to work with smaller groups of girls in breakout group sessions.
The pandemic also made it difficult for us to get the funding we needed to conduct outreach and purchase sanitary materials for distribution. This was partly because prices increased, and also because we had to spend money on additional items, such as sanitisers, masks and handwash soap. Most of our donors also faced financial challenges and couldn’t donate as much as they would like, and this is a challenge we continue to face.
For schools to reopen, a lot of CSOs, church-affiliated organisations such as the Salvation Army and local businesses donated hand sanitisers, masks, handwashing basins and soap. We helped ensure girls had access to basic needs to remain in school.
Civil society also called on the government to lessen restrictions on public interactions so that small businesses could reopen as well.
What are the main women’s rights issues in Zambia and how is civil society tackling them?
Some major women’s and girls’ rights issues in Zambia are GBV, economic inequality and unequal access to quality education.
According to African Impact, only about 31 per cent of girls in Zambia finish primary school, and only eight per cent complete secondary school. This is partly attributed to early marriages and pregnancies, but also to challenges such as lack of access to menstrual hygiene management products and facilities, especially in rural schools.
Low levels of literacy make girls more vulnerable as they grow into women. Most of them don’t understand the rights they have as women, especially those concerning sexual and reproductive health.
This also contributes to a lack of financial independence, which in turn makes women more susceptible to GBV. Limited education means limited access to business opportunities and funding. Many women are not able to draft a business plan, which is required to get a loan. Most lending institutions also require collateral, which most women don’t have, as they typically don’t own property. All this puts them at an economic disadvantage and increases their vulnerability.
There is a cultural trend for women to get just the bare minimum level of education and then become homemakers. Systems are not built to accommodate even the few who may want to take a different path.
Civil society works with government and communities to tackle these issues and bridge these gaps. Many CSOs, including WingEd Girls, support girls in different ways so they stay in school. We have a project to train girls to make reusable pads. The Salvation Army drills boreholes and builds toilets in rural schools. Copper Rose Zambia teaches girls about menstrual hygiene management and sensitises women on GBV and sexual and reproductive health and rights. Other CSOs, such as Africa Leadership Legacy, help women acquire business, financial and leadership skills. These efforts have inspired the government to take further action to support women and girls, and there are now government programmes to empower women, encourage women to establish businesses and provide greater access to education, especially in rural areas.
How can gender equality be achieved in Zambia and what is being done to that effect?
At WingEd Girls we believe that for real change to happen there needs to be an intentional change in direction, especially by the government. There is a need to mainstream gender policies and create awareness among girls and women of their rights.
Some policies to that effect already exist, but institutions seem to lack the motivation to implement them. Other policies are non-existent, and the government must put them in place. Policies around land ownership, access to education, gender-specific healthcare and access to business opportunities and financial assistance should be mainstreamed. Specific budget lines should be established to ensure an equal access to resources. More awareness programmes are needed to help women and girls learn about their rights and ways to access resources or assistance.
As GBV rose, church bodies and CSOs such as Zambia National Women’s Lobby have called on the government to take quick action. The government responded by promising it would establish fast-track courts for GBV cases, put in place policies and legislation to combat GBV and build shelters for GBV victims within communities. They in turn called on civil society to join in efforts to ensure anti-GBV services were made easily available for victims or potential victims.
To keep girls in schools, the government has recently included funding in the national budget to distribute sanitary towels in all schools across the country. But this has not made civil society stop its own work in that regard. WingEd Girls and other CSOs see a potential for partnering with the government and will continue to distribute menstrual hygiene management resources to girls.
To support female-led households, the government has partnered with the World Bank. Through a World Bank-funded project, Girls’ Education and Women’s Empowerment and Livelihood, it will help women access seed money to start businesses and access farm inputs. Lending institutions are also being encouraged to re-evaluate their loan access requirements to accommodate more women.
The International Women’s Day (IWD) theme for 2022 is #BreakTheBias. How have you organised around it in the communities you work with?
For IWD we organised a school outreach in a rural district of Zambia’s Southern Province. We moved it to 11 March because 8 March is a holiday and children will be off school that day. As usual, the event will include menstrual health hygiene talks and career mentorship sessions. We will distribute WingEd kits’,a package containing reusable and disposable pads, underwear, washing soap, and painkillers.
We have partnered with several organisations, including Africa Leadership Legacy, which will conduct talks about leadership and financial skills, and Toy-lab, an organisation led by a group of medical doctors who will talk about menstrual hygiene management. To inspire the girls with business ideas, a local business leader will also come to talk to the girls. Peer educators from Mike’s New Generation Version will also be part of the team.
Our aim is essentially to break the bias that society and communities have against girls, starting with access to education and career choices. In line with Sustainable Development Goal 4, we want to ensure girls have access to quality education despite the various challenges they face, including menstruation. We hope the mentorship we provide will enable them to choose career paths based on their passions and interests.
They shouldn’t have to choose a career because it is deemed suitable or ‘easy’ enough for a girl. What they really need is help to overcome challenges and exposure to information about the variety of career options available to them.
Civic space in Zambia is rated ‘obstructed’ by theCIVICUS Monitor.
Get in touch with WingEd Girls through itsFacebook andInstagram pages. -
ZAMBIA: ‘The abolition of the death penalty is a victory for civil society calling for respect of the right to life’
CIVICUS speaks about Zambia’s recent abolition of the death penalty and the role played by civil society with Macdonald Chipenzi, outgoing Executive Director of the Governance, Elections, Advocacy, Research Services (GEARS) Initiative Zambia, a civil society organisation (CSO) that promotes democracy and electoral integrity.What led to the recent decision to abolish the death penalty in Zambia?
Though the issue of the death penalty has been controversial and divisive in Zambia for some years now, and some people wanted to keep it on the statute books, there were various reasons behind the government’s decision to abolish it.
First, since Zambia was declared a ‘Christian Nation’ in 1992, only one execution of a death warrant was done, in 1997 by then-president Fredrick Titus Jacob Chiluba. Since then, no president has been willing to sign a death warrant for any convict condemned to death. Another president, Levy Patrick Mwanawasa, even vowed never to sign any such warrant because he did not want human blood on his hands. The abolition of the death penalty was necessary both for consistency with the declaration of Zambia as a ‘Christian Nation’ whose belief in the Bible is unequivocal and to keep up with regional and global trends.
Second, Zambia committed to abolishing the death penalty in the course of its successive Universal Periodic Review (UPR) examinations at the United Nations Human Rights Council (UNHRC), the latest of which took place in 2017. Several donor missions repeatedly reminded the state of Zambia that it must do away with death penalty and several meetings were attended in Geneva by successive Ministers of Justice on the same matter. Arguably, the desire for Zambia to have a tangible presentation on its commitments to the UNHRC to offer at the next UPR session, slated for later this year, explains the speed at which the abolition process has proceeded.
Third, there was consistent advocacy from a majority of civil society towards the abolition of the death penalty to comply with the principle of respect for the right to life enshrined in our constitution. The constitution has not been amended because this would require a referendum, but the elimination of the death penalty from the Penal Code means no court will be able to issue a death sentence and the highest sentence for those convicted of capital offices will be life imprisonment.
The development is therefore a victory for the CSOs that have been consistent in calling for the abolition of the death penalty and for respect of the right to life in Zambia. The death penalty was in contradiction to both the provision on the right to life in the constitution and the ethos of Zambia as a Christian Nation. However, there remains the gigantic job of removing the death penalty from the constitution – which is important to do, because if one day the country is led by a bloodthirsty leader they could still apply it if they find a constitutional provision allowing it.
How has civil society, and GEARS Initiative in particular, advocated for the abolition of the death penalty?
We found the basis to anchor our advocacy work for the abolition of the death penalty in the decades-long practice by Zambian presidents of refusing to sign death warrants against convicts sentenced to death. This made the death sentence clause of the constitution redundant and strengthened the position of human rights and pro-life CSOs.
Advocacy took the form of submissions to Constitutional Review Commissions and the African Union’s African Peer Review Mechanism as well as position papers presented at local and international meetings such as the UPR sessions where the Zambian government was present. CSOs also made presentations and submissions at international forums and had one-on-one meetings with foreign missions of countries that had abolished the death penalty and with those of states concerned with human rights, such as the European Union, the UK and the USA.
UPR sessions and pre-sessions and parallel events, including a recent one that GEARS Initiative was able to attend with support from CIVICUS, were used as a platform to advocate for the repeal of the death penalty. The creation of a critical mass of human rights CSOs synergised partnerships for joint and consistent advocacy activities that helped build momentum and compelled the government to act. It was also very crucial to build working synergies with local and international media to disseminate advocacy initiatives.
What are the next steps in your work?
There are a number of remaining repressive or archaic laws that should be repealed, reviewed or amended. These include the Public Order Act (1955), the NGO Act (2009), the Cyber Security and Cyber Crimes Act (2021) and the Contempt of Court Law, which is part of the Penal Code, among others. Except for the latter, the rest are already under review, with draft bills ready to be presented before the National Assembly. The Public Order Act, for instance, is being replaced with a Public Gatherings Bill.
Our next steps are to continue advocating for a speedy legal review process of these repressive laws by undertaking public engagement and media activities, auditing obnoxious sections of these laws and submitting our reports to state authorities and other stakeholders, including the media, CSOs, donor communities and parliamentarians. This may entail hiring legal consultants to do desk reviews, identify the sections that need to be replaced and recommend alternatives that are justifiable from the perspective of a democratic society. This, will of course, require the investment of more technical and financial resources.
What kind of support do you need to continue doing this work?
Last year, GEARS Initiative received short-term financial and technical support from CIVICUS and two US-based organisations – the International Center for Not-for-Profit Law and the National Democratic Institute – to conduct legal analyses of the NGO Act, the Cyber Security and Cyber Crimes Act and the Public Order Act and report back on what and why they needed to be repealed or replaced. The negative impact of the continued existence of these laws was analysed and shared, not only with media and civil society, but also with citizens, including in local and rural communities.
But for 2023, GEARS Initiative has not yet secured any support for its advocacy work towards the repeal of repressive laws. All our projects had short-term funding that ended in 2022, and had visible positive impact: they kept the government on its toes and pushed it to close the year with draft bills that it promised to table before the National Assembly in its first session starting in February 2023. GEARS Initiative was included in the Technical Committee on repeal and replacement of the Public Order Act and was further requested to make submissions on the review of the NGO Act and the Cyber Security and Cyber Crimes Act.
GEARS Initiative will need financial and technical support to be able to sustain the advocacy activities it embarked on in 2022. In collaboration with like-minded CSOs, GEARS Initiative wants to continue reviewing the various repressive laws that restrict civic and democratic space in Zambia, conducting community, stakeholders’, media and government engagement around the findings of those reviews, and advocating for the replacement of obsolete or repressive legislation.
Civic space inZambia is rated ‘obstructed’ by the CIVICUS Monitor.
Get in touch with GEARS Initiative through itsFacebook page.
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Zambia: Immediate drop-off trumped-up charges on Journalist Eric Chiyuka
CIVICUS calls on the Zambian authorities to immediately drop all the charges against journalist and activist Eric Chiyuka.
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ZIMBABWE: ‘Society is only starting to open up to the idea of living harmoniously with LGBTQI+ people’
CIVICUS speaks about the situation of LGBTQI+ rights in Zimbabwe and the ongoing impacts of the British colonial legacy with Samuel Matsikure, programmes manager at GALZ-Association of LGBTI people in Zimbabwe.Founded in 1990, GALZ is a civil society organisation (CSO) that seeks to promote and protect LGBTQI+ rights in Zimbabwe through advocacy, research, education and service provision.
What is the situation of LGBTQI+ people in Zimbabwe?
We have seen a slight improvement with the recent change of government. In the previous years, the late President Robert Mugabe would contently throw in homophobic statements whenever he addressed the nation. He openly attacked the LGBTQI+ community on both the local and global stages. The current government, in contrast, is not proactive in targeting LGBTQI+ people to push its political agenda. We are seeing fewer rights violations committed by the state against LGBTQI+ people across the country.
Nonetheless, the government’s relative silence and shift of focus do not mean things are now okay for LGBTQI+ people. In fact, this shift has left us with many unanswered questions because we do not know if the government really supports LGBTQI+ rights or if they do not want to deal with what is considered a very controversial issue.
Organisations advocating for LGBTQI+ rights continue to question politicians about their strategies to integrate LGBTQI+ people in the community. During the 2017 elections we reached out to political parties to make a couple of questions regarding the inclusion of LGBTQI+ issues in their agenda. Unfortunately, we only received responses from two parties, including the ruling party, the Zimbabwe African National Union – Patriotic Front (ZANU-PF).
ZANU-PF has recently become quite open about engaging with us on matters concerning the LGBTQI+ community. We see this as a milestone because it previously would not have a dialogue with the LGBTQI+ community. This has helped us to have more conversations with the government and look at the possibility of changing laws and policies. This has also made the public more open about having conversations with us than before. People now hear about LGBTQI+ rights and their responses are more positive than negative.
How do laws discriminate against LGBTQI+ people in Zimbabwe?
There are some provisions that promote inclusion, but the reality is quite different. Zimbabwe still has draconian laws that impede the rights of LGBTQI+ people. The current constitution has a bill of rights that aims to promote people’s right to health, privacy and freedom of association. The constitution recognises diversity and includes a non-discriminatory clause. But LGBTQI+ people still have their rights violated regardless of what the constitution says. The laws are there but their interpretation by various parties leads to discrimination.
According to the experiences we have collected from the LGBTQI+ community, discrimination in the health sector is widespread, although efforts are being made to sensitise and train healthcare workers to improve access for LGBTQI+ people and other key populations. Until recently, by law people were required to reveal their HIV status to their partners, and failure to do so was a criminal offence.
The recent decriminalisation of HIV transmission under the Marriage Amendment Bill will be a great milestone for the LGBTQI+ community. It was difficult for LGBTQI+ people to reveal their status to partners or healthcare workers because they did not have easy access to healthcare facilities and feared being reported to the police or arrested. So with the support of new policies and our HIV/AIDS national strategy, the result has been the provision of a comprehensive programme giving LGBTQI+ people the right to access these facilities. This shows that the state is willing to create a space in which people can access these resources; the question is whether they will monitor those spaces to ensure people are not harassed.
Discrimination against LGBTQI+ people is also present in the workplace. We have dealt with several cases of people being unfairly dismissed because of their sexual orientation or gender identity. Most businesses involved justify their decisions by saying their companies are founded on Christian values so they cannot work with or support LGBTQI+ individuals. This goes against labour laws banning discrimination in the workplace. Sadly, such cases cannot be taken to court and challenged because the legislation does not recognise LGBTQI+ rights. There are legal loopholes that allow the public to discriminate against LGBTQI+ people.
Unfortunately, we still have laws inherited from colonial times that cause segregation in our society. The law that criminalises same-sex practices dates back to when we were a British colony. As a result of this law, men who engage in same-sex activities risk a year in prison. The Immigration Act still discriminates against homosexuals and prostitutes. These laws were drafted during colonial times and are no longer applicable: we are a democratic country with a constitution that has a comprehensive bill of rights.
What work does GALZ do, and what challenges have you encountered?
For around 30 years, GALZ was the only organisation in Zimbabwe focusing on LGBTQI+ issues. But over the past years, we have seen the emergence of new organisations that are either LGBTQI+-led or are working with the LGBTQI+ community. Because of this, we have been able to reorganise ourselves and prioritise the things we want to focus on while letting other organisations deal with remaining issues.
GALZ’s work currently stands on four pillars. The first is community and empowerment. Our mandate here is equip LGBTQI+ people with life skills. We also want them to understand their human rights and to freely participate in economic and social activities. We inform them of the processes related to the development agenda and their role in it.
The second pillar is knowledge, documentation and ideas. The third is policy and law and the fourth is human rights and access to justice. We want to develop strong institutions that will ensure the participation of LGBTQI+ people in communities and uphold their rights. The third and fourth pillars are related to human rights and internal governance and their use is to raise the visibility of the community and provide services related to the rights to property, family and participation.
We want to build a technical hub for distributing information that will help LGBTQI+ CSOs and guide LGBTQI+ people in building CSOs in a hostile environment. Zimbabwean LGBTQI+ CSOs have been able to develop their own LGBTQI+ advocacy plan. This gives us the chance to speak as a collective and support each other’s advocacy work. By working together, we have been able to provide safe spaces for LGBTQI+ people in our country, including recreational spaces, internet access, support to complete academic studies, and support for students willing to pursue research on LGBTQI+ issues.
Given the importance of family, GALZ has built a portfolio for parents and friends of LGBTQI+ people, P-Flag. We bring them together to promote the acceptance of LGBTQI+ people within families and communities and share their experiences.
But we have faced some challenges. Zimbabwean society is starting to open up to the idea of living harmoniously with LGBTQI+ people but has not fully accepted us. We still face harassment from community members. LGBTQI+ activists are arrested for their advocacy work. In the recent past the state used to disrupt our activities and question our legitimacy. In addition, the proposed Private Voluntary Organisation (PVO) Bill threatens our work: there is fear we may not be allowed to register once the bill is passed. Human rights violations make it difficult for people to participate actively in LGBTQI+ movements.
How can Commonwealth countries work together to promote LGBTQI+ rights?
We need to acknowledge that many of these laws in Commonwealth countries are a legacy of the British empire. The laws we still have are repressive in nature and fail to acknowledge diversity and human rights. It is time for us to include the principles and practices of human rights in our laws. As organisations fighting for LGBTQI+ rights we need to pressure our governments to reform regressive policies and abolish laws that enforce discrimination and exclusion in our societies. We should pressure them to respect the constitution and hold people and institutions accountable for disrespecting people’s rights.
We should pool our resources to mobilise and form a global alliance to bring LGBTQI+ issues to the forefront. By working together we can defeat the discrimination that is embedded in our systems and challenge the laws that perpetuate the violation of human rights.
Civic space in Zimbabwe is rated ‘repressed’ by theCIVICUS Monitor.
Get in touch with GALZ through itsFacebook andInstagram pages, and follow@galzinf on Twitter. -
ZIMBABWE: ‘We need CSOs to continue working and defending people’s rights’
CIVICUS speaks about a proposed NGO bill and the threat it represents for Zimbabwean civil society with Ernest Nyimai, the Acting Executive Director of Zimbabwe’s National Association of Non-Governmental Organisations (NANGO).NANGO is the umbrella body of civil society organisations (CSOs) operating in Zimbabwe, mandated by its membership to coordinate CSO activities, represent the sector and strengthen its voice.
How do you think the proposed NGO bill would affect civic space in Zimbabwe?
In our view as the umbrella body of CSOs operating in Zimbabwe, the proposed Private Voluntary Organization (PVO) Amendment Bill presents the danger of further shrinking civic space should it sail through in its current form. The bill will put at further risk the fundamental freedoms that civil society is supposed to have to be able to do its work to improve people’s lives. This is due to quite significant proposed amendments that in our view are repressive.
Currently, more than 60 per cent of NANGO members are legally registered as trusts, and some are registered under Common Law Universitas. If this bill is passed as it is, they will be automatically deregistered and required to apply for re-registration under the new proposed PVO guidelines.
The PVO Amendment Bill proposes to criminalise CSOs that support, oppose or finance a political party or candidate. The clause does not clearly specify what supporting or opposing a political party or candidates entails. If a CSO opposes a party’s policy or governance practice, does this amount to opposing a political party? If a CSO gives legal support in an election challenge, does this amount to supporting a political party or candidate? This provision can be abused, especially against CSOs that work on democracy, governance and human rights issues. This provision is contrary to the right to the freedom of association provided for in section 58 of the Constitution of Zimbabwe. The imposition of harsh penalties such as imprisonment for violation of this provision without any justification or regard to civil remedies or administrative fines is grossly arbitrary.
Another reason the PVO bill can affect civic space is that it is phrased in a way that would make room for selective application during its administration. If an organisation is deemed to be operating outside its mandate, its board can be immediately suspended and an interim one can be appointed to act in its stead while a final decision is made. But procedures are not clear, so there is room for the responsible minister, the Minister of Public Service, Labour and Social Welfare, to arbitrarily suspend an organisation’s board due to personal interests. This kind of interference in the operation of CSOs would limit their independence and autonomy.
The PVO bill was prompted as a way to ensure compliance with Recommendation 8 of the Financial Action Task Force (FATF), which requires governments to review the adequacy of laws and regulations that govern non-profit organisations so that these organisations cannot be abused for money laundering and financing of terrorism. But in my view, the government deployed an omnibus approach to pursue many other interests besides the fulfilment of FATF Recommendation 8 requirements.
The bill in fact violates the FATF’s balanced approach, which stipulates the need to maintain an enabling operating environment to fulfil FATF requirements. The government has not concluded a risk assessment indicating which CSOs are at risk of being used for money laundering and financing terrorism. This is the ideal procedure as required by FATF to ensure the application of the risk-based approach to mitigating vulnerabilities to money laundering and financing of terrorism.
How would the PVO Bill, if implemented, affect NANGO’s work?
NANGO is registered under the existing PVO Act. But if the amendment bill goes into effect, many of our members will be automatically deregistered, which will have immediate repercussions on NANGO, whose greatest strength is precisely our membership. Besides, there are various clauses that impose sanctions and restrictions in terms of programming areas and NANGO is of no exception to this potential criminalisation of CSO work.
The new legislation will also weaken our eligibility for funding due to increased government interference in the operations of CSOs. The donor agencies we work with require recipient organisations to be independent and autonomous for the purposes of grant compliance. But the implementation of the new proposed PVO Amendment bill will potentially affect our independence and limit our autonomy. Development partners and donors may decide to stop funding CSOs in Zimbabwe if they view it as becoming too risky.
As CSOs we exist to protect the rights and dignity of people. If the new bill forces many CSOs to stop operating, the vulnerability of communities they serve and human rights abuses will likely increase. We need CSOs to continue working and defending people’s rights in an enabling operating environment. CSOs promote and protect human rights, but through the increased surveillance of CSO operations by security agencies, many activists, human rights defenders and civil society members will be abducted and tortured, and the security threat will increase.
How is civil society responding to this threat?
We have used a multifaceted approach, taking advantage of the various strengths we have as a large and diverse group of organisations. In the initial stages, we tried to push back against the PVO bill in many ways, including through litigation to expose the ways in which it would violate constitutional provisions. We also assessed the bill against the core humanitarian standards that we adhere to as CSOs.
Unfortunately, the bill has nonetheless progressed, so we are currently conducting scenario planning in which the law might be passed. Most of our efforts are focused on engaging, having a dialogue and negotiating with government officials for revision of repressive clauses of the bill. The bill is currently being debated in parliament following its second reading, so we are also advocating with parliamentarians to get them to really understand how this bill is going to affect the work of CSOs and those they work with.
We are also engaging with the body that administers the PVO Act, the Ministry of Public Service, Labour and Social Welfare, which played a key role in drafting the bill. We are trying to engage it in discussing the potential political, social and economic impacts of the bill. CSOs are a significant contributor of foreign currency in Zimbabwe: close to one billion dollars per year are coming in the form of official development assistance that is channelled towards various programmes implemented by CSOs. CSOs employ around 18,000 people. If they shut down or their activities are limited, barriers to overcoming unemployment will rise. Our desire and hope is to have an enabling instrument guaranteeing the space for civil society to continue its good work.
How can the international community help Zimbabwean civil society?
Zimbabwe is a member of various regional and continental organisations, which we have used to our advantage. We have engaged with regional and continental pressure groups, and especially the FATF, and they have shared their technical expertise on advocacy and lobbying, while also leveraging their convening power to help us engage with our government.
The international community should continue to assist us as mediators, especially in light of the hostility and limited confidence and trust between civil society and the government. It is very important that they highlight how the bill will affect the general role of CSOs in Zimbabwe. There is also politicisation of CSO work due to misinterpretation of the general role of CSOs in the national development discourse. For example, civil society has the key responsibility of holding the government accountable and advocating for people’s rights, and this bill threatens our ability to fulfil it. We need regional, continental and global organisations to help us advocate with the Zimbabwean government to ensure an enabling operating environment for civil society in line with the ‘whole of society’ approach that the government subscribes to.
Civic space in Zimbabwe is rated ‘repressed’ by the CIVICUS Monitor.
Get in touch with NANGO through itswebsite orFacebook page, or by emailing, and follow@ErnestNyimai and@nangozimbabwe on Twitter. -
ZIMBABWE: ‘Young women should be at the centre of discussion of the issues affecting them’
CIVICUS speaks about the upcoming International Women’s Day and Zimbabwean civil society’s role in eliminating gender inequality with Margaret Mutsamvi, Director of the Economic Justice for Women Project (EJWP).Established in 2017 with the purpose of helping narrow the gender inequality gap, EJWP is a civil society organisation (CSO) that works with young women to realise their right to sustainable economic independence. It promotes women’s socio-economic independence and full participation in economic governance and public resource management. It provides knowledge, skills and support to young women in local communities so they can self-organise and advocate for their socio-economic rights at all levels.
Has the COVID-19 pandemic impacted disproportionately on women and girls in Zimbabwe?
The pandemic definitely had a disproportionate impact on women and girls, first of all, because of Zimbabwe’s capitalist-centred response to containing the virus. Lockdown regulations entirely shut down the informal sector, in which 65 per cent of the Zimbabwean population is employed, restricting all movement except for formally registered employees who could present letters on their company letterheads, and of course frontline workers.
It should be noted that more than 67 per cent of the people working in the informal sector are women, so shutting down their income source pushed most of them into abject poverty, with no alternative livelihoods provided for.
Second, the prolonged lockdowns that followed found most survivors of gender-based violence (GBV) and those at risk of it locked up with the perpetrators of violence. As a result, GBV levels rose to a record-breaking 2,000 cases in the first month of the first lockdown, as reported by Msasa Project. Rape cases also increased under lockdown.
Third, the prolonged shutdown of schools, which lasted longer than eight months, created a productive gap among young women and induced extreme poverty. Possibly to escape this, many were forced into early marriages and teen pregnancies.
Fourth, the shift to online tools for learning purposes, along with a lack of smart devices, data poverty, and the unavailability of internet connections, left a huge proportion of students out of education, particularly in rural areas. Research carried out by the Women's Academy for Leadership and Political Excellence indicates that only 35 per cent of students had access to online learning. When those left out of school were girls, too often they ended up in forced marriages or pregnant.
Additionally, lockdowns in Zimbabwe resulted in shrinking civic space. People were unable to exercise their right to protest in the face of deteriorating socio-economic rights, so women were not able to do much despite the fact that they were worst hit by this regression.
Notably, it was under lockdown that the Constitution of Zimbabwe Amendment (No. 2) Bill was passed. The bill would allow the president to appoint judges to the Constitutional, Supreme and High Courts without legislative approval. He would also be able to choose his two vice presidents without an election and be able to delay the retirement of the chief justice by five years. CSOs organised the #ResistDictatorshipConstitution rally. Two young women, Namatai Kwekweza and Vimbai Zimudzi, were arrested during a peaceful protest.
Civic space has continued to shrink. As recently as January 2022, an initiative – the Private Voluntary Organisations (PVO) Amendment Bill – was submitted that will criminalise the work of CSOs. The bill ostensibly seeks to comply with international standards intended to ensure that CSOs are not misused by terrorist organisations, but this is being used as an excuse to clamp down on Zimbabwean civil society.
What has civil society done to support women and girls in this context?
CSOs were up and running providing services to people who reported cases of infection, putting out online campaigns, mobilising solidarity, providing information materials for COVID-19 awareness and prevention, providing sanitisers and masks at vegetable markets to ensure the informal sector could remain open and taking to the courts to challenge some unconstitutional government decisions. For instance, demolitions in the informal sector were challenged by the Chitungwiza Residence Trust and some activists held protests even though they knew they would get arrested.
As for ourselves, for a while, we were able to assist nearby communities in Chitungwiza, Epworth and Hopley, primarily by raising awareness about COVID-19 and handing out masks and sanitisers. We were also able to monitor key developments in communities throughout lockdowns through our community champions.
Movement was not easy, particularly, because the work done by CSOs is not considered an essential service. Since we had some projects running that were initially intended to be implemented through face-to-face activities, we had to shift online, with online engagement, online campaigning and online activities. We are now starting to do online advocacy campaigns through theatre. We have a series called ‘Zviriko’ that streams every Tuesday on our Facebook Page.
What are the main challenges for women's rights in Zimbabwe, and how is civil society addressing them?
The main women’s rights issues are socio-economic rights. It is appalling just how normalised the lack of adequate social services delivery for women is. This increases the burden of unpaid care work. As a privatisation agenda is implemented, limited access to basic health and basic and affordable education has decreased further. Decent work is a distant aspiration given the levels of abuse and rights violations that take place in the informal sector.
Additionally, there is an ongoing battle between the state and the Zimbabwean Constitution. The politics at play is unable to provide 50 per cent of female representation in political positions. There is no political will to facilitate the implementation of constitutional provisions as far as gender equality is concerned.
CSOs have consistently responded to this by providing services to survivors of varying forms of abuse, providing legal recourse, and creating awareness of these rights to build citizen agency.
There have also been lots of online campaigns, petitions and engagement around stopping the PVO bill that will deprive female citizens of much-needed socio-economic support once the work of CSOs is directly under state control.
The women’s movement continues to advocate for the full implementation of our new constitution and parity in political representation. Among other strategies, they are holding online campaigns and actively supporting aspiring female candidates to public office.
The International Women’s Day theme for 2022 is #BreakTheBias. How are you organising around it in the communities you work with?
Due to our focus on social and economic rights, #BreakTheBias speaks directly to our mandate, which is building women's power to defeat the socio-economic inequalities that continue to sideline women, particularly young women. We do this in many different ways.
First, through research and documentation. We believe that information is power, so producing knowledge is our first step towards evidence-based programming and advocacy.
For instance, we are currently conducting research about the nexus between illicit financial flows and tax justice in the extractive sector and young women in Zimbabwe. We have produced an assessment report to position young women in the 2022 national budget and the recently pronounced monetary policy statement, and we have published a policy brief advocating for gender-responsive policies for pandemic recovery.
We have also produced documentaries about the experiences of young women in mining communities and the socio-economic barriers faced by young women due to climate change.
Second, we strengthen the capacities of young women through training. We are currently providing training on fiscal literacy in Harare’s informal peri-urban communities, aimed at strengthening these women’s voices and agency in economic governance in Zimbabwe. In partnership with Transparency International Zimbabwe, we are also working to build women’s knowledge on gender and corruption. EJWP is also working on capacity building for young women on socio-economic rights and transformative feminist leadership.
Third, we feed our research into advocacy initiatives. We have ongoing advocacy with a series of stakeholders, particularly the Ministry of Finance and Economic Development, parliamentarians, the Gender Commission and other government agencies involved in gender issues.
Finally, we bring change to communities by encouraging people to address issues from the ground up. We have four Community Action Hubs so far and continue to build towards breaking gender bias by empowering young women. Our hope is that one day young women can be at the centre of key conversations regarding national resource collection, distribution and use. We also envision young women taking leadership positions at all levels, enabling them to add authoritative voices towards redressing the issues that are key to them.
Civic space in Zimbabweis rated ‘repressed’ by theCIVICUS Monitor.
Get in touch with the Economic Justice for Women Project through itswebsite orFacebook page and follow@EJWZim on Twitter. -
Zimbabwe: Release abducted activist Obert Masaraure immediately
CIVICUS calls on the Zimbabwean authorities to immediately release Obert Masaraure, an activist and human rights defender. Obert is the president of the Amalgamated Rural Teachers Union of Zimbabwe (ARTUZ), which works, among others, to defend the labour rights of teachers.
