Human Rights Defender of the Month: Gladness Hemedi Munuo

Human Rights Defender of the Month:  Gladness Hemedi Munuo 

October 2019
HRDs of the Month

Gladness Hemedi Munuo is a journalist and an award-winning gender activist from Tanzania, with more than 20 years of human rights and media experience. “Shrinking space and crackdown on media causes huge problems in Tanzania – to me it’s a thing that needs serious and immediate action,” she stresses.

Gladness holds a bachelor’s degree in social arts and a master’s degree in public health, as well as a diploma in journalism. Her extensive academic and professional work experience, in addition to her large motivation to improve the situation for women and children, alongside free speech and press freedom, makes her an essential voice in Tanzanian civil society.

Her work was recognised by GenderLinks who awarded her the Voice and Change Drivers 2019 Award. Having witnessed the many challenges women face while pursuing justice, especially in cases related to sexual and gender-based violence (SGBV), she started the organisation Crisis Resolving Centre (CRC) (Kituo cha Usuluhishi in Kiswahili). The organisation focuses on giving women free legal remedy, as well as educating citizens – both women and men – about women’s rights.

Having practiced journalism for 20 years, she utilises her strength in advocacy and communication when conducting awareness raising activities about SGBV. “I have trained hundreds of journalists who later go out to educate millions of people through mass media in Tanzania. Also, my work at the CRC has supported and empowered many women,” Gladness emphasises.

“I have trained hundreds of journalists who later go out to educate millions of people through mass media in Tanzania. Also, my work at the CRC has supported and empowered many women”

However, promoting women’s rights in a patriarchal system is not a walk in the park. “In some areas there is a conflict between gender issues and our African culture. That is one of the big challenges I face – culture is a big problem […] We have bad culture and we have good culture, but bad culture tends to accommodate more people.” However, she also points to some improvements, especially in rural areas, stating that “[i]t is very difficult to work with those [women living] in a patriarchal system, but slowly, slowly they are coming up.”

Logistical issues, often due to scarce financial resources, is another hurdle, in addition to lack of data and documentation about gender issues, especially SGBV. “The main victims are in the rural areas and getting proper data and records of such cases is also a great challenge,” she states. Simplified materials to talk about the issues affecting women would be of great help,” she points out, as “[i]t would make it easier for people to understand when their rights are being violated.”

“We have bad culture and we have good culture, but bad culture tends to accommodate more people.”

Gladness is of the opinion that regional and international actors should do more to support Tanzanian human rights defenders (HRDs). “We don’t have support for journalists. They cannot do investigative journalism, due to lack of funds, skills, and the dangerous environment […] We have a Swahili saying: if you do not protect the broken wall, then the whole wall will fall down” (usipoziba ufa utajenga ukuta in Kiswahili).

Gladness was part of DefendDefenders’ delegation at the 65th session of the African Commission on Human and Peoples’ Rights (ACHPR) in Banjul, The Gambia, where she together with DefendDefenders highlighted the human rights challenges in Tanzania, and the need to ensure the protection of Tanzanian HRDs.

See also DefendDefenders’ report Spreading Fear, Asserting Control: Tanzania’s assault on civic space.

See more HRDs of the Month

Human Rights Defender of the month: Veronica Almedom

Veronica Almedom is a poster child of successful immigration. A duo Eritrean and Swiss citizen, she was born in Italy, and grew up in Switzerland where she permanently resides. Her parents are some of the earliest victims of Eritrea’s cycles of violence. When Eritrea’s war of independence peaked in the early 1980s, they escaped the country as unaccompanied minors, wandering through Sudan, Saudi Arabia, before making the hazard journey across the Mediterranean into Europe. There, they crossed first to Italy, and finally, to Switzerland, where they settled first as refugees, and later, as permanent residents.

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:

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