Newsletter winter 2012

NEWS

winter 2012

FACING EXCLUSION IN AFRICA

Education of minors in prison

CONTENT p1 Lead photo p1 Word from the President Š IDAY-International aisbl

p2 Brief p3-4 Minors in prison p5 Advocacy p6 Restorative justice Raising voices for education in Africa

p7 Your commitment

Lead Photo

Prison of Uvira - 2012

ing

/2012 draw ium 2011 ation Belg in Lasne) n for Edrtucprimary school ig pa m Ca l sa the Globa ne, Maran Winner of contest (Antoi

Notice for philanthropist philatelists!

During the Global Campaign for Education 2012 in Belgium, advocacy messages drawn by children calling for education for all were handed over to the Belgian authorities. One of them was selected to be featured on the IDAY-International stamp.

20 IDAY stamp (BE) - 20 â‚Ź (+ expedition costs) (Available upon request to info@iday.org)

IDAY-International aisbl - 19, rue des Jambes - 1420 Braine-l’Alleud - Belgium Responsible publisher: J-J. Schul - Redactor in chief/graphist: D. Devillers Contact: T. +32 (0)2 385 44 13 - F. +32 (0)2 385 44 12 - info@iday.org Bank account: IBAN - BE 93 5230 8026 6767 - SWIFT - TRIOBEBB (TRIODOS)

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Marginalised children were never very popular. In many countries, seeking respect for the rights of minors in prison is almost an act of heroism.

After the young domestic workers and children with disabilities to whom June 16 was dedicated this year, IDAY-International wanted to pay tribute to the children deprived of their liberty in Africa and to our network's member organisations who fight every day for their right to education to be fulfilled.

Restorative justice is a traditional practice in many African communities. Currently, efforts are made to promote it in prisons. Africa could take a leading role in this endeavour, for the greater good.

Jean-Jacques Schul Founding member & Chairman of IDAY-International

Brief.

To all IDAY members and partners, and to those who have helped pursue our development in 2012, a Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!

May 2013 bring genuine relief to the African youth and allow them to build toward a bright future!

BELGIUM

The Global Campaign for Education

For the fourth consecutive year, IDAY-International coordinates the Global Campaign for Education in Belgium.

The NGO developed a pedagogical and sensitisation booklet in French and Dutch on the issue of education and health for all. Some 100 schools throughout the whole country will participate, with more than 4500 pupils of age 11 and 12!

IDAY-International was at the European Development Days 2012!

KENYA

Following a competitive selection process, IDAY-International was invited to present its documentary The Invisible Workers during the 2012 edition of the European Development Days held in Brussels on October 16-17, 2012. On this occasion, IDAY-International members also networked

Signing of a Memorandum of Understanding with Kenyatta

and exchanged with numerous development stakeholders on the issue of human-right based, inclusive and sustainable development in Africa.

University

The efficacy of the plant Artemisia annua to fight malaria, a particularly dreadful disease in Subsaharan Africa, is empirically demonstrated. These results need now to be confirmed clinically.

The Kenyatta University in Nairobi, Kenya, is set to take up this challenge in collaboration with IDAY. The foreseen multidisciplinary research will be conducted in compliance with the standards of the World Health Organisation.

Should the results be positive, they will benefit the whole of Africa and thus contribute to improve health ... and the conditions for quality education.

IDAY-International is committed to help raising the necessary funds to implement this programme with a view to helping improve quality education for all.

AFRICA

IDAY's French-speaking coalitions unite for the Francophonie Summit!

IDAY's French-speaking African members took advantage of the 14th Francophonie Summit that took place on October 12-14, 2012 in Kinshasa to address a collective message to the heads of States and governments of French-speaking countries.

In their joint declaration, they urge the authorities to pursue and step up their efforts to achieve quality education for all on the continent.

WELCOME

IDAY's Honorary Committee welcomes a new member!

Since September 30, 2012, Dr Oley DIBBA-WADDA, Executive Director of the Forum of African Women Educationalist (FAWE), replaces Dr Codou DIAW, former director of this organisation, in IDAY's Honorary Committee. Dr DIBBA-WADDA is a gender equality specialist for international policies and has experience in multicultural and multidisciplinary programme management.

Want to follow IDAY-International news?

Join our IDAY Facebook page!

More info? info@iday.org

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I often hear people say that prisons are like hotels. Let everyone come and see with their own eyes! I hope that nobody would ever have to pay to live in such conditions!

˝

Jan De Cock, after visiting 163 prisons around the globe

Prison of Uvira - 2011

DENIED EDUCATION Each year, hundreds if not thousands of minors end up in prison in every country. Detained with their parents, delinquents or used as “bate”, sometimes arrested on grounds that do not stand for imprisonment, many of them are not even 13 years old. In countries where justice is often the poor cousin of all institutions, their story reflects that of a juvenile justice still in its infancy and of severely dysfunctional judiciary and penitentiary systems.

In the absence of appropriate infrastructure or out of ignorance of their age, many minors end up being locked up with adults in overcrowded prisons characterised by harsh living conditions.

Canteens and kitchens are often lacking. At the Makala juvenile prison in Kinshasa, DRC, the detainees receive sporadically minimal food rations, mainly maize flour, that they cook on shaky stoves fueled with their own clothes when no other fuel is available.

Poor sanitary conditions render access to drinking water challenging as well.

Often, the prisoners owe their survival to the intervention of families or a few NGOs who provide them with food, health care, clothes and mattresses.

Physical, psychological and oral violence are a daily reality. As for the guards, very

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few of them have been trained to take care of these children and teenagers.

Even for petty crime, many juvenile offenders are detained preventively for months, sometimes even years pending their trial, without access to proper legal counselling or information on their fate. Some youngsters remain in prison beyond their term because they are unable to pay the exit fee, or

Some penitentiary authorities use it to pressure the prisoners, threatening to deny access to those who don’t behave.

Deprived of their right to education while detained in a prison that often turns into a criminal school, most juvenile prisoners will never resume their training once they are out. What promises does the future hold for these youngsters, many of whom are from

simply because they were forgotten by the system and they are unaware of the duration of their sentence.

destitute backgrounds, stigmatised by society and sometimes broken by their experience in prison?

Education pays the price for these dysfunctions. When available, it often boils down to a few hours of class per week, indistinctively of everyone’s initial education level. One of few occupations available in the midst of disastrous living conditions and forced idleness, the “school” finds itself hijacked.

More than just a means to preserve social order in prison or fight recidivism, education is a fundamental right which no child must be deprived of. Including – perhaps especially the minors deprived of their liberty.

JANE

Ë?

Thanks to the Uganda Children’s Centre (UCC), a member of IDAYUganda, Jane1, young woman and former teenage prisoner, found a place in society.

Jane was working as domestic help for a family in Kampala until she molested the 6-month old toddler in her custody.

Caught red-handed and sentenced, she was sent to the National Rehabilitation center of Kampiringisa where she was referred to UCC. Jane attended a specialised and adapted vocational training programme programme.

She also received psychosocial counseling.

Trained at last, she returned to her home district and with the help of UCC's partners, opened a hairdressing salon.

She now contributes fully to the life of her community.

Jane was a victim of society's indifference to the exploitation of children as domestic workers.

Being exposed to a harmful environment, she succumbed to maladapted behaviours.

Her training empowered her by raising her awareness of her own rights, thereby enabling her to resist exploitation.

This UCC initiative deserves to be replicated in all the other centers so that the children deprived of their liberty may become responsible and respected citizens through capacity development.

The UCC education team is compiling its training modules to develop a training manual aimed at guiding other organisations and the authorities. It regularly appeals to the government to take up its role as provider of education to all, including children in prison.

Open schools, you will close prisons Victor Hugo

Morris Kizito Mukasa, Founding director of Mission After Custody (MAC), a member organisation of IDAY-Uganda committed to education for minors in prison, and Marc De Maeyer, former senior researcher at UNESCO and member of IDAY-International's management committee, tell us about education for minors in prison in Africa.

What is education in prison?

Marc De Maeyer: education in prison goes beyond conventional schooling.

It encompasses altogether the training of guards and prison staff, the protection and enforcement of human rights and the transformation of every activity (cooking, health, culture, sports, reading, recreational, etc.) into an educational activity. Any activity can be educational, especially for children in prison. Conversely, everything can be anti-educational if prisons remain what they are now.

Morris Kizito Mukasa: I created MAC as a response to the sufferings and injustice I once fell victim to when I was illegally detained. Disregard for the prisoners' rights by the authorities prevails as well as the ignorance of their rights by the detainees themselves. I wanted to plead for reforms on all these issues.

How does IDAY help in this process?

Why education?

Marc De Maeyer: Through advocacy for education, IDAY encourages the States to give everyone the opportunity to shape their own life plans.

Morris Kizito Mukasa: Ignorance is clearly one of the main factors of delinquency. It is thus essential to free the children from the burden of illiteracy and to give them the chance to be informed and educated.

We will otherwise be responsible for tomorrow's criminality if we let peer education be the only form of education to be found in prison.

No demand for education – no education; no education, no demand. These circles add to each other and form a downwards spiral of exclusion: without education, one cannot recognise oneself as holder of rights and subject of law; if not a subject of law, there is no possibility of formulating demands - including for education.

Why did you create MAC?

1. Fictional name used to keep her identity confidential.

More info? info@iday.org

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Advocacy.

The minors deprived of liberty are very often forgotten in the education plans and programmes of many an African country and development stakeholder.

For several years, IDAY members have raised the issue of their access to education and training, of which most of them are deprived during their incarceration. In DRC, Cameroon, Burundi, Uganda, Togo and Senegal, member organisations are already actively committed to helping these youngsters. Yet, they often do so in isolation, with little social support and scarce resources.

Through concertations conducted with Defence of Children International (DCI)-Belgium over the last 2 years, organisations in Africa and in Europe have identified priority actions to bring about general and long-term improvements on this issue across the continent. They were articulated into a regional programme that is about to be launched with members of the 2 networks.

The first step will be to map the number and detention conditions of minors across several African countries, with a focus on their access to education. These data, together with a thorough assessment of the legal and policy provisions in each country, will be the building block of advocacy campaigns towards the justice and education authorities so that education and training programmes for juvenile detainees be effectively in place and running. IDAY and DCI member also plan on carrying out awarenessraising activities to fight the social stigma, foster restorative justice approaches and facilitate the reintegration of these youngsters in the school system and in society.

Project Bank.

The IDAY Project Bank is a pool of low cost and quality initiatives from African civil society to foster education for all in Africa. It shows to the governments that the right to quality education for all is achievable and essential to their countries' development.

The projects are funded by phase. All donations, even small ones, are useful.

Support our projects! Check www.iday.org or contact us directly at info@iday.org!

Project 20 Country CAMEROON

Cost 79 529 â‚Ź

Number of children 200

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School behind bars

Schooling and training of minors in prison The association Grain de Sable, a member of IDAY-Belgium, strives to safeguard the right to education of minors in 9 prisons in West Cameroon, and to foster their reintegration into society by helping them build self-confidence and reinstating a positive image of detainees.

The project allows these youngsters to acquire

multiple knowledge and skills in order to facilitate their reintegration and lower recidivism.

The project also aims at inducing a change in perceptions by communities and families and at restoring the family bonds damaged by the experience of detention.

Non Violent Communication and the Restorative Circles

Interview with Anne BRUNEAU, Trainer in Non Violent Communication (NVC) What is the added-value of your trainings in a penitentiary environment?

These trainings help people genuinely share their experience and feelings, develop mutual understanding and respect, build stronger bonds and a sense of solidarity. They trigger compassion and help transform anger/revolt and desire for revenge. Empathy means that "might is right" no longer prevails; one can become aware of the impact their behaviour has on themselves and the others. It also gives you the drive to change, which all in all helps improve the social atmosphere inside the prison.

Have you witnessed any significant changes?

Since 2010, I have been training the guards and detainees of Dakar's main 2 prisons in Non Violent Communication and in Restorative Circles facilitation. The detainees have organised advisory and conflict management services, which has proven very helpful for conflict resolution and a more peaceful atmosphere inside the prisons. Violence among the prisoners, humiliating and degrading treatments have since then significantly decreased. A number of former prisoners trained in these approaches organise from time to time reconciliation circles with the families of the detainees with a view to facilitating their reintegration.

How do the Restorative Circles work?

The process is guided by a facilitator and unfolds in 4 phases: the creation of a restorative system, during which all the community members can access the circles; the pre-circle (individual interviews), the circle with its dialogue process; the after-circle (evaluation). The circle brings together the one who suffered damage (victim or plaintiff), the perpetrator

The NVC process of Marshall Rosenberg1 It is a journey into awareness and into one's heart, a philosophy of life that invites us to overcome our cultural, ethnical, religious, linguistic, social, educational, professional or age differences. We tend to be full of prejudice, criticism, interpretations ‌ In Non Violent Communication (NVC), we translate these "locking" thoughts into a lively and universal language: that of feelings and needs (values), which are common to all human beings. Actions directed towards Life, solutions that take into account everyone naturally emerge from listening and understanding one another without trying to obtain something in return. NVC supports the idea that violent behaviours or crimes are nothing but tragic strategies desesperatly aiming at fulfilling universal and neutral - e.g., neither good nor bad - needs. We therefore make a distinction between a person and their needs, the actions they take to address them.

and community members who may help solve the conflict.

This approach stems from the idea that we all make mistakes and that they are actually an opportunity to learn from it.

It is about establishing responsibilities rather than seeking culprits. The aim is not to punish. Instead, the process aims at educating, restoring the interpersonal bond and reparing the damage that was done.

Could this principle apply to minors in prison?

Besides the importance of creating juvenile tribunals, it would be paramount to sensitise the justice authorities to this type of approach and to organise restorative circles prior to sentencing or incarcerating juvenile offenders.

Social workers and educators as well as judicial assistants involved with detention facilities could be trained in facilitating and guiding the restorative circles as well as make suggestions to the judges as to possible action plans.

Finally, social workers trained in this approach could propose, when possible, such circles to the families of vulnerable children with a view to reintegrating them into the community before they slip into delinquency to survive.

Are the long term effects already visible?

In Brazil this type of meetings has been commonly used for over a decade. One can see that not only they bring about real mutual understanding, but also that there is such a strong awareness of the offenses committed that recidivism is decreasing. As a whole, this approach contributes to advancing global solutions, perhaps even to "healing" communities.

Restorative Circles and Restorative Justice according to Dominic Barter2 They are based on NVC principles. It is a collective process that can be related to African traditional cultural practices (palaver tree, talking and healing circles, ‌). There are however differences: the equity principle (gender, age, social status), allowing for real power sharing within the circle as each participant holds an equivalent right to speak and equal weight in the decision-making process; the absence of punition.

Restorative Justice does not challenge existing legal provisions.

Nonetheless, its value lies in the creation of a system in which perpetrators are invited to take stock of the consequences of their acts and to understand the pain of the person who suffered harm. The dialog process fosters mutual understanding between individuals while enticing everyone to acknowledge their responsibility. Participants then strive to elaborate action plans together to heal and restore the human bonds.

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More info?

Anne Bruneau (Belgium) annebruneaucnv@yahoo.fr - +32 (0)2 660 61 16

2

http://www.nvc-europe.org - http://www.cnvc.org http://www.restorativecircles.org http://vimeo.com/6557584

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