East African liberation movements meet in Nairobi

Pan-African movement Africans Rising on Thursday brought together various rights groups and human rights defenders from across East Africa working to liberate their communities.

The activists convened in Nairobi for the East African Regional Consultation held in preparation for the All-African Movement Assembly (AMA) that will be held in Arusha, Tanzania in August.

Prince Agpa from Africans Rising said that the Assembly would bring together liberation movements from across Africa and the diaspora.

“Five years ago, we held a validation conference to launch the formation of the Africans Rising movement in Arusha and in August, we shall go back to Arusha to restrategise, rethink new ideas with all member organisations who are part of the movement,” he said.

While they wait for August, the movement is holding regional consultations across Africa to have open discussions with grassroots rights organisations.

“We are going to have 8 regional meetings in total and have similar discussions as we are having today so we can see which areas or issues we need to focus on and how better we can work towards the liberation of Africa,” he said.

Ann Maua, Coordinator of East African Collaborations, said that all forms of organizing and advocacy were important as long as everyone played their part well.

“A lot of people organise differently. Social media works for us, advocacy works for us, street protests work for us, and boardrooms work for us. The movement space is big enough for all of us as long as we all do what we do best to the best of our ability,” she said.

Maua said that all these ways become interconnected eventually so supporting each other’s advocacy was vital.

Njoki Gachanja from the Githurai Social Justice movement said that because liberation organising is interconnected, activists should support each other to fight the same system under which their oppression becomes the same.

“Where we go wrong is thinking that someone else’s struggle in fighting for land justice, for example, is not our struggle because we fight for reproductive health rights yet the same system is the cause of our separate yet same struggle,” she said.

She said that organising is aimed at liberation and liberation will only be achieved by stopping an oppressive system.

Simon, an activist from Uganda said that most importantly, liberation movements from across East Africa need to learn from each other.

“We need to see what other countries are doing that is working and go back home and try to replicate that where our ways are not working because we are our own heroes. Our liberation will come only from us so we need to learn from ourselves,” he said.