May 29th, 2021
This week’s highlights
- Your Support in Action Worldwide: Understanding the impact of COVID-19 in Mali and South Africa
- Save the Date: Night4Rights 2021 slated for October 20!
- Deadline extended: Apply for JHR’s Misinformation Project’s bursaries!
- We’re hiring an Associate Manager (International Programs)
- Test your human rights knowledge with the final round of our quiz series
Your Support in Action Worldwide:
a webinar in Mali about COVID-19’s impact on women entrepreneurs and a Spotlight episode on the right to education in South Africa
JHR believes that during a pandemic, and beyond, having access to the right information can save lives. It can also help inform better policy solutions to major human rights problems. These are the principles behind our 12-country, Global Affairs Canada-supported program Mobilizing Media to Fight COVID-19, led at head office by Director of Policy Janine deVries.
On May 18, JHR Mali organized a live Facebook webinar on support interventions for women entrepreneurs whose businesses are gravely impacted by the COVID-19 pandemic. The Director of the Support Fund for the Empowerment of Women and the Development of Children (FAFE) of the Ministry for the Promotion of Women, Children and the Family in Mali discussed the topic with JHR media trainer Dado Camaro and women entrepreneurs who related their challenges in the past 15 months.
Mme Coumba Diakite started her business By’Recycl in 2018. Her business converts used plastics into quality furniture and contributes to protecting the environment in Mali. Since March 2020, her business’s activities came to a standstill, the impact of which has been enormous. “We have not produced or sold anything. We had invested in a new location, hired new employees. Only because of my savings and the support of others, have I been able to pay the bills,” shared Diakite.
Mme Sangare Aissata Kone, president of L’Association Benkadi, shared “COVID-19 has slowed down our activities, especially in the agricultural and food sectors. Our sales have decreased and we lack the credit to relaunch our businesses.”
During the event, the role of banks and microfinance institutions in creating easier access to credit for women entrepreneurs was discussed. It was proposed that banks adapt their conditions for access to credits and reduce their interest rates. Women entrepreneurs also encouraged the state to purchase handsoap and facemasks from women-run businesses in their effort to help prevent COVID-19.
Read the full recap of the webinar (en Français) here.
Spotlight is a Facebook video series focused on the impact of COVID-19 on human rights, especially of women and girls, in South Africa. The series is brought to viewers by JHR’s Mobilising Media to Fight COVID-19 (MMFC) program in partnership with Media Monitoring Africa and Sound Africa.
In the seventh episode of Spotlight, the focus is on the right to education. Host Jedi Ramalapa opened this week’s episode with the sobering words of Shenilla Mohamed, Executive Director of Amnesty International South Africa, “A child’s experience of education in South Africa is still dependent on where they are born, how wealthy they are, and the colour of their skin.”
Ramalapa spoke to freelance journalist Siphokazi Mnyobe from Knysna in the Western Cape, and Anele Gcwabe, Communications and Social Media Consultant at ACTIVATE, about their views on reducing South Africa’s education gap that has been widened by COVID-19.
Watch the episode here.
The above stories are part of the Mobilizing Media to Fight COVID-19 project funded by
Save the Date:
JHR’s Night4Rights is this October 20!
Night for Rights will take place at the Brickworks Pavilion in Toronto from 6pm-8pm, on October 20, 2021. This year, mindful of potential public health concerns, we’re putting on an extended cocktail party in an outdoor setting. We will have both on- and offline speakers and entertainment, and attendees can choose to attend either on- or offline. Tickets are $500 or $5000 for a group of 10. More details soon at www.night4rights.com!
We’re hiring: Associate Manager
(International Programs)
Fancy working at JHR? We are looking for an Associate Manager to join our International Programs team on a maternity leave contract. Reporting to the Director of International Programs, the successful candidate will help manage our projects in the Middle East and Africa.
LOCATION: Canada (remotely)
DURATION: 4 months (with possibility of extension)
START DATE: ASAP
APPLICATION DEADLINE: Applications will be reviewed on a rolling basis until the position is filled.
For more information about the position, please click here.
Deadline extended:
Apply for the Misinformation
Project’s bursaries
As part of our Misinformation Project in partnership with First Draft News, JHR is launching a call for proposals to support Canadian news organizations’ coverage of online misinformation during the COVID-19 pandemic. The deadline to apply for the bursaries has been extended to Monday, June 7, 2021.
The bursaries will provide successful applicants with a one-time grant to produce original and timely reporting on stories related to online misinformation.
Canadian news organizations, journalism professionals and journalism students studying in Canada who have received JHR’s training and are interested in investigating the issues, events and tools covered in the training sessions should apply.
Click here for more information.
Test your human rights knowledge
with our weekly quiz!
JHR’s quiz series is now entering its final week, and we received a record number of responses in the last round! We congratulate our top scorers so far, and encourage our readers to take part in the final quiz. This week’s focus is Ghana, Liberia and Sierra Leone.
JHR’s quiz series, launched on World Press Freedom Day, has tested participants’ knowledge of human rights challenges and successes in the 12 host countries of our Mobilizing Media for COVID-19 project, while sharing some inspiring insights and stories of change emerging from MMFC and earlier JHR projects.