Date: 3 – 6 September 2018
Time: 09:00 to 16:00 (from Monday to Thursday)
Venue: Room 2-2.1, Faculty of Law, University of Pretoria,
Deadline: 10 July 2018
The Centre for Human Rights, Faculty of Law, University of Pretoria with the support of the Embassy of the Kingdom of the Netherlands, cordially invites you to apply for the Capacity Building Workshop on Strategic Advocacy & Litigation targeted at the promotion and protection of the human rights of lesbians, gay, bisexual, and transgender persons in Africa.
About the Workshop
The 3rd LGBT Human Rights Defenders Workshop will be held from 3-6 September 2018 at the Centre for Human Rights, University of Pretoria in South Africa. This year’s workshop will focus on empowering the LGBT human rights defender in Africa on how to conduct strategic advocacy & litigation.
Background
It is now four years since, the African Commission on Human & Peoples Rights passed resolution 275 calling upon state parties to curb violence directed towards people who identify as either gay, lesbian, bisexual or transgender. The violence and/ or discrimination targeted for these groups continues to exist despite the existence of this resolution. Human rights defender and activist working on LGBT issues continue to face different threats in relation to their work.
Against this background, thus, the Centre for Human Rights, Faculty of Law, University of Pretoria will be conducting a four-day capacity building workshop for LGBT human rights defenders. The capacity building workshop is designed to assist LGBT activist in Africa to effectively promote and protect human rights through domestic, regional and international level advocacy and litigation.
The workshop is targeted at experienced LGBT activist who want to further develop their skillsets. It will include a combination of expert’s presentations delivered by Centre for Human Rights staff as well as other experienced human rights defenders on advocacy and litigation opportunities. It will also include inter-active advocacy and litigation exercises at regional and international levels.
The workshop seeks to strengthen the capacity of civil society organisations so that they can better pursue legal challenges and advocate on behalf of LGBT individuals at risk of or having suffered serious violations of human rights. The workshop also aims to have participants learn from each other about the challenges of filing cases at domestic courts.
Participants
The workshop seeks to bring together activists, scholars, practitioners, advocates for law reform, LGBT individual from across Africa to address the issues of strategic advocacy & litigation.
This programme is directed at experienced human rights defenders in non-governmental organisations, with existing advocacy experience at the national level and some prior knowledge of the international human rights system.
Funding
Limited funding for travel and accommodation is available to support participants who will be selected for the workshop. Successful applicants will be notified of their selection by 1 August 2018. Selected applicants will be required to take care of visa costs in their respective countries.
