Afrika Nå: Beginning of an African spring? Student activism under pressure

Name: Afrika Nå: Beginning of an African spring? Student activism under pressure
Start: 2025-01-29T18:00:00+01:00
End: 2025-01-29T19:30:00+01:00
Location: Kulturhuset

Schedule

Wed Jan 29 2025 at 06:00 pm to 07:30 pm

UTC+01:00

Location

Kulturhuset | Oslo, OS

A wave of youth and student-led protests have swept across the African continent the last year; from Kenya, Uganda and Mozambique to Senegal, Togo and Comoros. At the same time, the state of civic space is deteriorating globally and the same is true for many African countries. Student activists and other human rights defenders who try to hold their governments accountable and demand that human rights are respected, face huge risks. In many African countries we are also seeing a proliferation of restrictive legislation used to stifle fundamental freedoms.
This trend is not something new. Students have always been one of the first to take to the streets when justice, equality and human rights are on the line. In response, students and academia are common targets for authoritarian leaders. According to SAIHs Activism under Attack 2024, student activists across the globe see delegitimization, social pressure and university lawfare as the biggest barriers to doing activism, in addition to more brutal forms of repression.
So what does student activism on the African continent look like? What types of repression are young human rights defenders facing? Why are we seeing so many protests in African countries now? Some are predicting an "African spring" with protests spilling over to neighboring countries. Is this likely? What are African activists risking while trying to better the situation in their countries? How is civil society pushing back against autocratic regimes and can activists in different countries learn from each other? Which role can Norwegian civil society and the government play? And what is the way forward?
There will be a short presentation of the latest Activism under Attack-report, followed by a panel discussion.
In the panel:
- Gabiey Ndukuya, leader of Swaziland National Union of Students (SNUS). Recently elected to the National Executive Committee in Southern African Students Union (SASU).
- Emmanuel Gumbo, human rights activist from Zimbabwe. Gumbo is currently doing his masters in Theory and Practice of Human Rights at the University of Oslo.
- Bintu Zahara Sakor, Doctoral Researcher at PRIO. Sakor's key research areas include Political and Economic Development of Sub-Saharan Africa, and she is particularly interested in Demography, Youth bulges, Gender and Conflict Dynamics in West Africa (and Sahel region).
- Tone Sørfonn Moe, Norwegian lawyer who has worked with civil society and human rights issues for years together with the Norwegian Support Committee for Western Sahara. Moe represents several activists, including a group of student activists from Western Sahara, pro-bono, and actively works toward the UN Human Rights Council.
There will be time for questions from the audience.
The moderator will be Selma Bratberg, leader of SAIH.