Chair of the ENAR Aisbl and ENAR Foundation│JEDI Consultant at Hand in Hand against Racism│30+ years in Policy and Advocacy│Human Rights Defender│Decolonial Expert│PhD Researcher│Public Speaker│Social Influencer.
International Day for the Elimination of Racial Discrimination was established in 1966 by the United Nations Assembly in response to the Sharpeville massacre that occurred there on the 21 March 1960. 69 innocent civilians where shot and killed and 180 were injured. What actions have we undertaken to eliminate racial discrimination? It is morally and ethically disturbing that 64 years after Sharpville, few of us are aware of the Flour Massacre that took place on 29 Feb 2024 during which 118 unarmed Gazan civilians were killed and 780 injured. This year's theme "A decade of Recognition Justice and Development: Implementation of the UN international decade for people of African descent" calls upon us to address matters that impact upon people of African descent. Since this year marks the tail end of the 2014-2024 decade I strongly advocate for the implementation of a new decade 2024-2034 with updated themes such as intersectional recognition, climate justice and restitutive development. The ultimate goal is to dismantle exclusionary colonial structures that have persisted to date at a local, national and global level, which in their turn deter equitable access to opportunities and shared resources. I strongly advocate for the implementation of #JEDI (#justice, #equity, #diversity and #inclusion) principles that are anchored upon #decoloniality and #intersectionality. I believe that the voices of those who have been targets and victims of structural exclusion have been silenced, ignored or erased in public discourse. Moreover, the rise in the far right discourse, coupled with neoliberal diversity and inclusion policies seem like platitudes and lip service. We need to aspire for structural change and desist from wallowing in futilities about points and commas of what action to implement and/or lack of clarity on what, how and when to implement them. Accordingly, I suggest a #paradigmaticshift from #allyshiptopeership that is aimed at a collective albeit differential responsibility to address the problem as comrades at arms. I believe that this mutuality would counter the prevalent European lethargic inertia with a decolonial and intersectional perspective that has the propensity to be socially impactful, relevant, mobilising, and sustainable. #learnunlearnrelearn #UNPFFPAD #ARDW2024 #europeancommission #recognition #justice #development #genocide #sharpvillemassacre #flourmassacre #ceasefire https://lnkd.in/dmMdva-r. https://lnkd.in/d-DZ-fVx
#CeasefireGaza. Not-A-Professor or Associate Prof & yet somehow...Writer, Academic, Race Criticality, Anti-racisms, Decolonial thinking and practice: Navigating the 'Decolonising Process’ tinyurl.com/486r6h88
7moThank you Nyanchama Okemwa for this cogent reminder that all our experiences of racial oppression are fundamentally connected by both history and the real-time geo-politics of colonial relations right now. Its high time both policy makers and change-makers listened to the resounding voices of people who not only witness what is going on in Gaza, but who desperately want this to stop. If decoloniality framed, intersectional anti-racism is anything, it is about human compassion, and need to live in a world where all worlds are possible and allowed to thrive. Your message is a call to think, act and change forward movement so that European anti-racism is also the anti-colonial and anti-settler-colonial resistance against genocide in Gaza, and all parts of the world where the vulnerable are extracted and dispossessed by racial colonial systems.