United Nations Declaration on HRE & Training, 2011

Posted by : Nduta Kweheria

The UN Declaration on HRE & Training comes at an ideal time for Kenya; when we have just passed a new Constitution whose Article 2(6) states that "any treaty or convention ratified by Kenya shall form part of the law of Kenya under this Constitution."

The Kenya Human Rights Commission (KHRC) is one of 17 organizations that in 1998 formed a network to lobby for the incorporation of HRE in the formal schools curriculum at primary and secondary school level. While some gains were made in the curriculum launched in May 2002 and which became effective in schools in January 2003, these the full realization of this is yet to be achieved.sted 

The new constitution has meant that the Ministry of Education will have to revise the schools curriculum to be in line with the new constitution. KHRC has seized this new opportunity for advocacy by i) undertaking a KAPs study on the level of acces to the right to education ii) Audit of primary and secondary school curriculum to establish HRE gaps and iii) the production of a children's story book on Equality / non-discrimination and iv) Revision and update of a teachers HRE training manual developed in 2000. All these tools which will be completed in April 2012 coupled with the good relationship that KHRC enjoys with the Ministry of Education and in particular its curriculum department - the Kenya Institute of Education (KIE), are what is needed to renew efforts aimed at lobbying government to sign and ratify the UN Declaration on HRE&T.