Netherlands Institute for Multiparty Democracy

“When you do the kind of work we do, going out on the streets, being beaten up, tear-gassed, vilified and abused, you never imagine that anyone would honour you for doing that, you just think that you are doing what you have to do.

"If only Kenyans would appreciate these medals as much as we appreciate the medals we get from our athletes”, sighs human rights defender Njeri Kabeberi.

In October 2009 Ms Kabeberi was awarded two prizes: a Humanity Award by the Frankfurt Chamber of Lawyers in Germany [link], and a Democracy Ribbon in the Netherlands [link], for her commitment to human rights and democracy in Kenya. We met before the ceremony in The Hague, not very far from the International Criminal Court (ICC) where Kenya’s post-electoral violence is being examined.

Half joking, Ms Kabeberi remarks that had she been an athlete, she would have been given an escort and a uniform by the Kenyan authorities. But as far as the international recognition she has just received for her twenty year sprint in the field of human rights is concerned, she has received no words of praise from the government. “A prophetess not honoured in her country”, as a Daily Nation columnist put it.

Ethnicity

She does not seem surprised, recalling that she was among twelve Kenyans who appeared on a hit list after the country’s descent into the abyss following the disputed 2007 Presidential elections. Accused of trying to broker peace between the various ethnic communities instead of showing loyalty to the leaders of her own community, Ms Kabeberi did not dare to remain in her home for several months after receiving death threats. Around 1,000 people were killed and over 500,000 displaced in that period.

Ethnicity, she says, is Kenya’s ‘weak link’, and it is exploited at will by the political establishment. President Mwai Kibaki (whose election was confirmed in 2008 following a power-sharing agreement with his rival Raila Odinga) “has excelled in playing the ethnic card”. But ordinary Kenyans, she points out, “are not ethnically-oriented. They don’t wake up every morning thinking how they are going to harm the other community.”

Part of her recent efforts with CMD-K, of which she is the director, has been to “build bridges of understanding” between the different groups and bring them not only to acknowledge and accept their differences but even to celebrate that diversity.

“We all need to more or less be in love with each other so that we can enjoy that country that we inherited from God.”

In the tense period that followed the contested elections, her main contribution was to serve as a ‘shuttle’ between political parties as well as women’s groups she had previously worked with and two other civil society organisations. “The CMD-K is respected by all groups so we even facilitated some of the meetings in our offices.”

Human rights

Ms Kabeberi, who has devoted most of her adult life to defending human rights both at home and in East and Southern Africa, says her understanding of concepts such as democracy and human rights has deepened since she first got involved in campaigns for the liberation of political prisoners in Kenya, and her work with Amnesty International.

For a long time, she and other Kenyans fought for multiparty democracy as an alternative to the one-party state. When she joined the Netherlandssupported CMD-K, there were over 160 political parties in Kenya. None of these parties, however, counted women, youth, people with disabilities or minority groups among their members. “They were just patriarchal parties.” She came to the conclusion that in true multiparty politics, it is not sufficient to have many parties: these parties, as she sees it now, should be ‘inclusive’.

Ms Kabeberi’s travels abroad, where she first confronted manifestations of gay rights, prompted her to redefine her conception of human rights: “I found people demanding rights that I had never thought about. So now I say that you judge a country’s development and respect for human rights by how they treat the weak, the minorities and the marginalised.If you treat your gays and lesbians as people who need to be killed, flogged and jailed, then it means that as a country you’re not developing.”

This, she says, also applies to the way internally-displaced people – Kenya’s weakest inhabitants – are being treated at the moment. They are often ignored or disregarded.

Future

There is still so much to do in Kenya. Is it not time for the activist to run for office? It’s a question she’s been asked often. Her ‘no’ is not categorical. She says she needs to prepare the ground first. “I’d rather be outside cleaning that system so that when I’m in that system I can actually give to Kenyans that which I’ve always preached.”

With her two European medals and another “even more humbling” award she received in July in Kenya from the Mau Mau freedom fighters for helping push for the recognition in parliament of their contribution to Kenya’s independence, Njeri Kabeberi is more determined than ever to put on her running shoes and make sure she completes the race.

This article first appeared on the Radio Netherlands Wordwide website.

Return to the NIMD Magazine 2010 Table of Contents.