Convening across movements - decolonising human rights and climate justice

You are invited to join an intersectional evening of storytelling, solidarity, and deep listening with activists, human rights defenders and movement builders. From Brazil to Palestine, Indonesia to Kenya, Zambia to Uganda, they will share their struggles and stories, inviting us to decolonize our human rights and climate justice work and presenting ways to support their resistance.

In a world of severe economic and climate crises, many of us are aware of the need to take part in collective action and build global solidarity, deepening our connections across borders and movements to the people and places most impacted by oppression and extractivism. Current inequalities and gaps between rich and poor are a consequence of political and economic choices, deeply rooted in colonial histories. These inequalities are furthered by the climate emergency, caused by rich countries and urgently felt by the most impacted communities: farmers, indigenous communities and land defenders, queer and feminist activists, and rural women throughout the majority world. In the midst of great challenges, activists and social movements are standing against corporate exploitation, austerity, and government repression out of necessity for the survival of their communities and our planet.

Location: Tolhuistuin Amsterdam, Tuinzaal

Time: 20:00-22:00 - Walk-in: 19:30

Moderator: Sahar Shirzad

Activists and speakers:

Ajuna Tadeo – Uganda . Tadeo is a social justice, gender equality and climate activist whose work is aimed at equal access to work opportunities, fighting deforestation, zero tolerance to gender-based violence, ending inequalities and discrimination based on race, sex, ethnicity, gender, and religious affiliation.  He works as the Platform Development Specialist at Uganda Agribusiness Alliance that advocates against unfavourable government policies/laws affecting the agriculture sector. Tadeo is also the Coordinator of the Youth4Agribusiness Initiative, an initiative started to curb youth unemployment through agriculture.

Anindya Restuviani – Indonesia . Anindya or known as Vivi, is an Indonesian feminist activist who is involved in a wide variety of initiatives that advocate for intersectional feminist issues. Currenly work as the Director of Jakarta Feminist Association, Vivi initiated Women’s March Jakarta and coordinated a team of amazing feminist activists throughout Indonesia and Southeast Asia. Vivi has been involved in influencing policy and legal reform regarding sexual and reproductive rights in Indonesia, including being part of the national team that advocate for the Criminal Act of Sexual Violence Bill that passed in 2022. Currently, Anindya also works for IWRAW Asia Pacific as programme officer for Advancing Gender Equality in the World of Work.

Eric Njunguna - Kenya . Eric is a youth climate justice organizer based in Nairobi, Kenya. Eric is the campaigns director at the Kenya Environmental Action Network where Eric leads a team and a vibrant network of youth climate activists in developing campaigns and programs in Kenya. Eric is a part of the Fridays for Future MAPA (Most Affected People and Areas) Network where together with youth, they have been working to amplify MAPA voices globally.  In August of 2021, Eric together with Greta Thunberg, Adriana Calderon and Farzana Jhumu, signed the foreword to UNICEF's groundbreaking report ''the children's climate risk index report'' on behalf of Fridays for future and has attended COP26 and COP27 representing young climate activists.

Manal Shqair - Palestine . Manal is a Palestinian grassroots organizer working with Stop the Wall Campaign, an organization based in Palestine. As part of her grassroots work, Manal focuses on how the climate crisis in Palestine is intertwined with and exacerbated by Israeli apartheid. Currently, Manal is doing her PhD at Queen Margaret University, Scotland in which she looks at the role of Palestinian semi-nomadic women in disrupting Israeli settler colonial dispossession. 

Muhammed Lamin Saidykhan - The Gambia. Muhammed Lamin is an award-winning Pan African Advocate of the year 2018 and was named as 100 most influential young people leaders in Africa in 2019. He was recognized as one of the Most Influential People of African Descent (MIPAD) 100 Under 40 Worldwide in support of the United Nations International Decade for People of African Descent in 2020.  As a human and environmental rights activist, he, with comrades, organised widespread protests leading to Gambian dictator Yaya Jammeh to step down. Muhammed Lamin served as the Movement Coordinators of Africans Rising for Justice, Peace and Dignity for five years. He now works as the Head of Movement Building for Climate Action Network (CAN). 

Joining us remotely:

Evane Lopes Dias Silva - Brazil . Evane is a Brazilian, native of the city of Paracatu, Minas Gerais, quilombolas*, Human Rights defender recognized by national and international organizations, among them Global Justice and Front-Line Defenders. Evane’s life came under threat when resisting a Canadian mining company’s take over of quilombola land. She is a lawyer, a Member of the Advisory Group of UN Women Brazil, speaker and activist for women's rights, activist for the rights of quilombola communities and their territories. Evane is the first quilomola woman to enter the training course for future Brazilian Federal Judges, in partnership with EDUCAFRO.  *Quilombolas are Afro descendant who are also considered part of Brazilian original peoples, alongside indigenous peoples, and likewise they guard territories and traditional forms of knowledge and living preserving the environment. 

Aditi Kapoor - India. Aditi works on climate change and governance with a focus on livelihoods, development and gender. Her expertise lies in research, policy advocacy, training and capacity strengthening as well as communications. Aditi has done her research in villages and in urban slums and connects field realities with State, national and global policies and programmes, addressing convergence of disaster risks, climate shocks and environmental degradation. Aditi started her journey as a journalist with The Times of India, winning fellowships and awards for her work on environment and rural reporting. Currently co-founder and Trustee of Alternative Futures, a small think tank based in India, Aditi is also Technical Advisor to Red Cross Red Crescent Climate Centre for the Asia Pacific region.

This event is organised by Oxfam Novib and is part the projects: African Activists for Climate Justice & FAIR for ALL.

About Oxfam Novib: Everywhere in the world, people fight for equality. They demand a world that is inclusive, safe, equal and sustainable for everyone. Oxfam Novib stands behind these courageous people. Together we fight for equality. And change the systems that divide us, once and for all.

In the project, FAIR for ALL we aim to strengthen civil society to create space and mobilise people across geographies, to demand and contribute to more inclusive and sustainable trade and value chains. Ones that respect human rights, protect the environment and promote women’s economic empowerment.

African Activists for Climate Justice (AACJ) is amplifying voices in Africa demanding that women, youth and local and indigenous communities can defend and fulfill their human rights and live dignified lives in a healthy and sustainable environment, within the context of the climate emergency.

Host or Publisher Oxfam Novib