The United Nations Association of South Africa (UNASA), in collaboration with Amnesty International Stellenbosch hosted their second annual Human Rights Youth Conference at Stellenbosch University (SU) on Saturday 21 April improving on their first conference with plans to follow up on participants Human Rights projects.
Many people showed up to the event which was hosted in the Arts and Social Sciences building. Young people between the ages of 16 and 25 were welcome to sign up for the conference, which focused on Human Rights Education and Training, Project Cycle Management and personal project development.
The conference was set up to teach participants how to run their projects, as well as what they should focus on. They were then given the opportunity to brainstorm their ideas for their own projects and present them.
Participants at the Human Rights Youth Conference. PHOTO: Amnesty International Stellenbosch Facebook.
The conference’s aim was for participants to be able to develop their own human rights project and to address a human rights issue in their communities which can be implemented over a six month period. The projects will be followed up and evaluated by the Amnesty International Stellenbosch human rights team.
Xola Njengele, events coordinator of Amnesty International Stellenbosch, says that this is what last year’s conference lacked, as they did not follow up and “see these projects through”.
The Amnesty International Stellenbosch and University of Cape Town (UCT) chapters also offer assistance to any participants in need of assistance with their Human Rights projects.
This year’s panel discussion theme built on the #22YearsLater campaign. The discussion was centred around how far we have come with the constitution since its first draft. “You will notice this year’s conference has no keynote speaker as we are trying to deviate from putting the spotlight on one person because it is a collective effort” says Njengele.
The panel was made up of BA International Studies student and project manager for the Africa Matters initiative Aluwani Ramarumo, SU law professor, Sandra Liebenberg, campaigner and translator at amandla.mobi, Nqaba Mpofu and chair of the student parliament at SU, Anthony Andrews (20).
During the discussion, Mpofu highlighted that although the constitution has been translated into many languages, the translation lacks the scaffolding that is needed for people to understand how the laws are aimed to protect their human rights.