Mathare Social Justice Centre (MSJC) is an initiative by young members of the community to promote social justice in Mathare. For years Mathare has been a place where much violence has been allowed to go on without any redress for its residents. These forms of violence include, but are not limited to, land grabbing, forced evictions, police abuse and extrajudicial killings, political impunity and other economic, social and psychological violations.
In view of this ongoing situation, a collective of young community activists in Mathare came together in 2015 to envision a centre that would promote more participatory forms of justice. Since then we have been involved in a number of initiatives, most notably our foundational campaign to document extrajudicial killings that resulted in the launch of our 2017 report titled: Who is Next? A Participatory Action Report Against the Normalization of Extrajudicial Killings in Mathare.
We work in all wards of this constituency to fulfil our core mandates: social justice advocacy and the documentation of human rights violations. These objectives are captured in both our vision and mission which are:
Our Vision: To have a Mathare free of human rights violations.
Our Mission: To promote social justice through engaged community and social movement platforms.
Currently our ongoing campaigns, all anchored in participatory action research, are:
- Art for Social Change
- Reproductive justice
- Arbitrary arrests, Enforced Disappearances & Extrajudicial Killings
- Political Accountability and Political Education
- The Mathare Green Movement
- The MSJC Kids Social Justice Club
- Disability Justice
- Maji ni Haki
While a majority of our members are between the ages of 18-45, we work with and for all generations, genders, religions and ethnicities in Mathare and beyond.
Our secretariat is composed of: Juliet Wanjira, Rahma Wako, Gacheke Gachihi and Wangui Kimari.
Contact us at: matharesocialjusticecentre@gmail.com