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A Voice For the Voiceless

MISSION

The Advocacy Project seeks to help community-based advocates produce, disseminate and use information, and so become more effective advocates for human rights and social justice

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The Team

Survivor Corps and the Advocacy Project have put together an experienced team to work on the Africa project. Email them directly with suggestions and ideas. We welcome feedback.


 

Director, Africa Project

Mendi Njonjo is the Director of the Africa Programs for the Advocacy Project, based in Kampala. Before joining AP Mendi was a founder of FAWERS – a network of African Women who work for post-conflict reconstruction and end to the use of gender-based violence as a tactic of war. Prior to that, she worked for the International Federation of the Red Cross in Nairobi, Kenya and The Center for the Prevention of Genocide in Arlington, Virginia.  Mendi is fluent in English, Swahili and Kikuyu. She has a Master’s degree in conflict resolution from the University of Massachusetts in Boston and has written on the impact of humanitarian aid on conflict resolution; the influence of women’s rights in post-conflict resolution in Africa. Email Mendi!

Researcher: Great Lakes Region

Robert Mugisha comes to Suvivor Corps with extensive experience with human rights and democracy in Africa. He has an LLB from NUR Rwanda, a post-grad diploma in humanitarian law (UL, Sweden), an LLM in Human Rights and Democratization in Africa (UP, South Africa), and a Master of Professional Studies in Legislative Affairs from George Washington University.  Since 2004, Robert has been working as a Country Specialist at Amnesty International USA focusing on the Great Lakes Region of Africa. Before, he volunteered as an Associate Legal Officer with the UN International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda. In 2002, he was a Fellow at the UN University of Tokyo-Japan where he was trained in International Cooperation and Development. In 2002, he was a Coordinator of the Center for Human Rights and Democratization in East Africa. Between 1999 and 2000, Robert served as the Head of the Human Rights Division in Rwanda's ministry of justice. Email Robert!

 
Waldette Cole is an International Program Assistant at Survivor Corps. Since joining LSN in 2006, Waldette has worked in the International Program department assisting in program monitoring and evaluation, economic opportunity and program expansion projects.

Prior to joining Survivor Corps, Waldette worked in policy development, finance/accounting and legal analysis. Waldette has also provided global strategy development consultancy in the private sector. Waldette graduated from the University of Maryland with a BA and BS in Political Science and Communication and is concluding her MBA in International Business. Email Waldette!


Pierre Claver recently joined Survivor Corps as the Burundi Country Coordinator for the Africa program. Pierre Claver has been working in conflict mitigation and reconstruction for ten years in Burundi. He has seen that humanitarian aid was providing food but also creating dependency without delivering any lasting impact. As a result, Pierre’s approach is to build local capacity.

Pierre worked with CARE International, where he was responsible for developing a 12-member alliance of civil society organizations. By targeting very small, grassroots organizations, the alliance was able to scale up the programs - many are now partnering with international NGOs.

Pierre has become something of an expert on land issues, which is becoming a major issue for IDPs in Central Africa. He commissioned a study to see how communities can engage in land disputes and make recommendations. A series of focus groups has built some real expertise and thrown up several individuals, who have since become international advocates on the issue. Email Pierre!


Albert Nzamukwereka holds a BA in political history from the National University of Rwanda and a post graduate certificate from The University of Peace in Costa Rica in media and genocide.

Albert founded Never Again Rwanda whose mission is to work on genocide prevention by engaging youth in critical thinking and generate new ideas for the future.

He has also worked for La Benevolencia, a Dutch media company, as Deputy Country Director. Their mission is to empower groups and individuals that are targets of hate speech and ensuing acts. It runs large scale broadcast campaigns in Rwanda and Burundi as a powerful tool in support of reconciliation and justice processes in the Great Lakes region.

Albert is now the Country Program Coordinator for Rwanda of Survivor’s Corps.

AP Peace Fellow

Annelieke van de Wiel will be working this summer as an AP Peace Fellow, supporting the Africa program from Gulu in northern Uganda, where she will be working with IDP populations. Annelieke studies public international law at the University of Amsterdam, focusing on human rights and national and international refugee law. As President of the Student Association of International Law she has organized a wide variety of symposia and activities addressing human rights. She volunteers at the asylum Application Centre at Amsterdam Airport, where she helps asylum seekers and refugees who have just arrived in The Netherlands with their asylum application For the last half a year she has also been an intern at the UNHCR national office in The Hague. Prior to Amsterdam, Annelieke studied modern history, religion studies, anthropology and human rights at the University of Utrecht. During a student exchange in Buenos Aires she witnessed the legacy of violent political suppression. Upon her return she felt she could no longer be a mere bystander to human suffering deriving from persecution, violence and the denial of fundamental human rights. She has developed a deep respect for the courage of survivors. Email Annelieke!

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