Background
Haki-Afrika Association is a non-profit making organisation formed in 2002. The primary objective of the association is to strengthen linkages between university teachers/educators of Human Rights in the Great Lakes Region. This is meant to enhance teaching capacity in human rights at university level, and to ensure that human rights issues are integrated within the university teaching curricula in each of the respective institutions.
The founding members of Haki-Afrika were lecturers from five universities located in the Great Lakes Region. These are: Makerere University (Uganda), University of Dar es Salaam (Tanzania), University of Nairobi (Kenya), National University of Rwanda (Rwanda), Chancellor College/University of Malawi (Malawi). Accordingly, to date the association consists of five national chapters, which are: The Uganda, Tanzania, Nairobi, Rwanda and Malawi chapters, respectively.
The association was formed as the culmination of an exploratory workshop held in Uganda in November 2002, whereby those in attendance (mainly university lecturers), expressed keen interest in further engagement and networking activities. This first workshop was organized by the Danish Institute of Human Rights (DIHR). To date DIHR continues to support Haki-Afrika's activities. This was followed up in December 2002 with a meeting in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania, whose objective was to establish a regional network for the promotion of post-graduate university human rights education in the Great Lakes Region.
The activities of Haki-Afrika are coordinated by a rotating secretariat, with a mandate to operate within a two-year period in a particular member institution. At present, the Kenya Chapter is hosting the secretariat , having taken over from Malawi, which on its part, took over from Uganda.
The activities of Haki-Afrika include: holding consultative and research workshops with participants drawn from the membership, developing materials to build the capacity of teachers in the field of human rights and publishing an yearly Journal of Human Rights (in progress). The association is also seeking to work with the institutions represented to establish new teaching programmes. Thus far, members of Nairobi Chapter have developed concept papers proposing the establishment of a programme offering a Master of Arts degree in Human Rights and a Centre for Peace and Human Rights Studies.
Photo: Members gathered at the Second Research Workshop held in Uganda in 2005.
