Human Rights Defender of the month: Godfrey Kagaayi

Born 33 years ago, in Bukoba, northern Tanzania, Godfrey Kagaayi did not have to look elsewhere for inspiration to tackle the daunting challenge of mental health. By his own admission, the family and community in which he was raised were fertile grounds for the same.

His family had crossed the border into Uganda when he was barely 5 months, settling into present day Rakai district.  But the Rakai of the 90s was a difficult place for a child to make their earliest memories: In 1990, Uganda’s first ever case of HIV/AIDs was reported in the district, setting off a decade of suffering and anguish for many of its residents. Taking advantage of the Rakai’s fishing and polygamous lifestyle, the novel virus spread like wildfire, killing people in droves and leaving untold heartache in its wake. With little awareness about the disease at the time, a young Kagaayi watched his panicked community resort to witchcraft, and, failing to find reprieve, waste away in alcoholism, provoking a spate of domestic violence and breakdown of families.

“It was a really difficult time. With no treatment at the time, people would suffer and gradually waste away, in agony, sometimes abandoned by their family who thought they had been bewitched. I lost close relatives myself, and even as a little boy at the time, those traumatic memories stayed with me,”

Neither did home offer much respite for Kagaayi. With 12 siblings from three mothers, life at home was dotted by routine sibling conflict over limited resources, domestic violence, and the family’s humble means meant that school fees for him and his siblings were not guaranteed.  But rather than dissuade him, these experiences served to steel Kagaayi more. He persevered through school determinedly, becoming the first in his family and local community to complete the Ugandan school cycle, from Primary to University.

“My background challenged me to break the chain of destitution, resignation and underachievement in my community – I wanted to be a beacon of hope for the kids coming after me,” he says.

Even then, it wasn’t smooth sailing. In 2009, Kagaayi was admitted for Bachelor of Medicine and Surgery at Makerere University but would not be able to complete the program. The program was one of the most expensive, and considering the financial constraints at home, he struggled to raise tuition, and gradually descended into depression.  which he could not talk about because of the prevailing stigma at the time.

“I was very depressed, yet I couldn’t open up to anyone because very few people appreciate depression as a serious health challenge. It is even worse when you’re a man, because our patriarchal society does not make room for you to be vulnerable,”

Eventually, Kaggayi abandoned Medicine and enrolled for a Bachelor of Arts in Social Sciences, which was a much “lighter” and a more affordable program.  But his experience with depression left him determined to make it easier for future mental health victims like himself to find space to open up and get help.

Accordingly, in 2012, in his final year at university, Kagaayi started a social and emotional support group at Makerere, which he fittingly named; Let’s talk!

“We would empathetically listen to the patients to appreciate their triggers and counsel them. We would then follow them up to their families to train the family members on how to manage and relate to these patients to support their full recovery,” he says.

In 2017, the Befriender project ended, but Kagaayi had left an impression on the doctors at Mulago. Impressed with the Befriender Centre’s work, Mulago’s mental health unit wanted to continue following up their patients after clinical treatment, and they asked to work with Kagaayi on the initiative. Smelling an opportunity for more impact, Kagaayi run fast to start Twogele Centre for Mental Health, a community-based organisation (CBO) that would scale work around mental health, beyond suicide prevention.  

“With Twogele, we were seeking to expand our support to include all mental health patients, including those suffering from bipolar disorder, anxiety, schizophrenia, depression, name it,” he says.

Under the new arrangement, Mulago’s mental health unit refers recovering mental health patients to Twogele, the latter organises them in peer groups to benefit from peer-to-peer support, after which it follows up with their families on how they can support the patients’ complete recovery. Twogele then proceeds to organise community barazas in the patients’ communities to raise awareness about mental health, using the recovered patients as ambassadors to assure the community that like any other diseases, mental health issues are preventable and curable. From the community, they then identify other patients whom they refer to Mulago for the preliminary clinical treatment, before repeating the cycle.   

“Our complete cycle model is actively demystifying the stigma around mental health,”

Since 2017, Kagaayi says they have been able to support about 690 mental health patients referred to them by Mulago hospital. In turn, he says, Twogele has been able to identify over 100 patients through their community mental health barazas, whom they have referred to Mulago for initial clinical treatment.

To maintain this work, Kagaayi says Twogele has also trained 35 Village Health Teams (VHTs) from across Kampala and Wakiso districts on how to identify, support and refer, where necessary, people with mental health symptoms. “We have also identified and trained over 30 peer-support workers who support patients at our mental health clinic at Mulago. These also often support our community work as mental health ambassadors during Twogele’s mental health barazas,” he says.  

Twogele’s efforts have not gone unrecognized. In February 2021, the CBO was awarded the Ember International Mental Health Award for their community mental health work. This year, in March, Kagaayi was appointed Principal Coordinator for the Movement for Global Mental Health (MGMH), an international initiative dedicated to improving mental health and well-being worldwide. He says Twogele’s goal is to decentralize mental health services, make them accessible and reduce stigma: 

“Most mental health services are urban based. So as Twogele, we would like to see these services decentralised to at least every district to benefit more people who’re stuck at the grassroots without any form of support. That is what we’re trying to do in the communities. Our hope is that progressively, we shall be able to de-stigmatize mental health, and normalize its treatment as we do with physical health, he says.

See more HRDs of the Month

Human Rights Defender of the month: Omar Faruk Osman

Omar Faruk’s career, and the passion that drove it, were the product of his circumstances. He was born in 1976, in the first of strong man Mohamed Siad Barre’s two-decade rule over Somalia, which was characterized by gross rights abuses and barely existent civic space. He came of age in the 90s when those abuses and rights violations were peaking, as his country was engulfed by a ruinous civil war following the collapse of the Siad Barre dictatorship.

Human Rights Defender of the month: Rita Kahsay

When the Ethiopian Federal Government representatives and those of the Tigray People’s Liberation Front (TPLF) signed a peace agreement in Pretoria, in November last year, the two parties were hailed for ending arguably the deadliest conflict of the 21st century, in which over 600,000 people had died.
But long before the negotiators for peace got around to an agreement, there were many other unsung heroes, who, through individual and collective efforts helped sustain the world’s gaze on the dire situation in Tigray, despite the Ethiopian Government’s determined efforts to hush it up.

Human Rights Defender of the month: Godfrey Kagaayi

Born 33 years ago, in Bukoba, northern Tanzania, Godfrey Kagaayi did not have to look elsewhere for inspiration to tackle the daunting challenge of mental health. By his own admission, the family and community in which he was raised were fertile grounds for the same.
His family had crossed the border into Uganda when he was barely 5 months, settling into present day Rakai district. But the Rakai of the 90s was a difficult place for a child to make their earliest memories: In 1990, Uganda’s first ever case of HIV/AIDs was reported in the district, setting off a decade of suffering and anguish for many of its residents. Taking advantage of the Rakai’s fishing and polygamous lifestyle, the novel virus spread like wildfire, killing people in droves and leaving untold heartache in its wake.

Human Rights Defender of the month: Hiader Abdalla Abu Gaid

Hiader Abdalla Abu Gaid is one of the lucky survivors of Sudan’s latest conflict.

He was born 36 years ago, in Almalha locality, North Darfur state, the third born in a family of 10. Then, Darfur was not the hot bed of war and conflict it has since become infamous for. Although the region, predominantly inhabited by Sudan’s black population remained segregated by the predominantly Arab government in Khartoum, its people co-existed in thriving, predominantly subsistence communities. In Almalha, people reared camels and cattle, while others tended crops. The community was also famed for its hospitality to strangers, welcoming outsiders who ended up staying, owning land, and intermarrying with their hosts.

Human Rights Defender of the month:Immaculate Nabwire and Daphne Nakabugo

In personality, Immaculate Nabwire and Daphne Nakabugo could not be more different. Where the former is loud, if free-spirited, and mischievous, the latter is quiet, reticent, and predominantly solitary. Together though, they are the quiet champions behind DefendDefenders’ digital skilling programs, equipping (women) human rights defenders with critically transformative – and sometimes, life-saving digital tools and skills.
“You’ll be surprised how many people out there, including the literate are not exposed to the idea of digital safety. And as technology gets more advanced, it is getting ever more lucrative for hackers and other malign actors, which means that the urgency of the need for digital security skills for everyone cannot be over-stated,” says Daphne.

Human Rights Defender of the month:Mary Pais Da Silva

On 17 February 2023, in Ethiopia’s rustic resort of Bishoftu, more than 5000Km from her homeland, Mary Da Silva was announced winner of the 2023 AfricanDefenders Shield Award, in the presence of hundreds of colleague human rights defenders from 36 African countries. It was a fitting validation for the Eswatini human rights lawyer, whose sense of empathy and sensitivity to injustice has been a defining hallmark of her career.
Born 45 years ago in Lubombo, eastern Eswatini, the last of 4 siblings, Mary attributes her values to her upbringing. Although she was born in Eswatini, her parents are originally from Mozambique, and only relocated to eSwatini at the start of the Mozambican civil war that lasted between 1977-1992, which ravaged families and displaced many others.

Human Rights Defender of the month: Jane Naini Meriwas

Like many African societies, The Samburu community in Northern Kenya is a gerontocracy – a very hierarchical community in which elders hold sway over almost all private and public matters. Among these predominantly pastoral nomads, very little importance is attached to the young – especially young girls, who are barely given a chance at education and often married off before their first menstrual cycle, but not before they undergo mandatory Female Genital Mutilation (FGM).
It is in this community that Jane Naini Meriwas was born 46 years ago, in Kipsing village, Oldonyiro Subcounty, Isiolo County. When she was 16, her mother passed on, and she watched with great trepidation as her father planned to marry another wife, not sure what that would mean for her or her ambitions for school. As it turned out, fate was on her side. When her father uncharacteristically asked what she thought of his plans, Jane seized the opportunity to stand up for herself and interests:

Human Rights Defender of the month: Kasale Maleton Mwaana

Kasale’s human rights activism precedes his years. The son of pastoralist parents from Ngorongoro district in northern Tanzania, he grew up seeing his parents and entire community having to defend their land and way of life against authorities who thought their lands could be put to better use. Now, at 25, Kasale is already one of the most recognizable advocates of his people’s cause, much to the ire of Tanzanian authorities.
“Our people’s struggle goes back many generations. It started with the pushing out of our forefathers from Serengeti to gazette Serengeti National Park in 1959, and then further evictions from the Ngorongoro crater to gazette the Ngorongoro conservation area in 1975. Since then, every generation has had to resist further evictions. It’s now my generation’s turn,” he says.

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