Catherine Nyambura is a Young Leader, with the distinction of being a Mandela Fellow. A feminist and an SDGs advocate, Catherine's activism has revolutionized many lives. Here's her story in her own words.
Let's start
with your story. Tell us a bit about yourself - your childhood, education,
growing years, turning points, and work.
I grew up in one of the biggest slum in Nairobi-
Mukuru Kayaba, the daily lived reality of my early childhood years was a
combination of disappointment and stark inequalities. This meant witnessing my
friends die from maternal mortality at the age of 17 and her daughter barely
survive to be one month, losing my friends to HIV/AIDS at the age of 15 years
and having to live with the loss of our close family friend to HIV( father,
mother and child). This is not to mention my near attempted rape experience.
One of the things that gave me strength and hope was that I did well in school
and had a clear vision of not wanting to be ever be poor. I found solace in
books and developed a culture of reading and exploring the world through books
early. My excellence in class led me to get scholarships (even though with
difficulty) and I went ahead to study Bachelor of Science and Technology in
Egerton University. It is while at school that I was introduced to a special
club (The Gender Students League). The league is a forum for students from all faculties that
provides a platform for students to
discuss and advocate for gender equality, tackle harmful practices in
pastoralist communities, sexual and reproductive health and rights, leadership,
governance, mentor girls, fundraise for and promote girls education, and inspire social change . I navigated
hierarchy within the league to become one of the leaders and finally found not
only a safe space but also what would be my career path after completing my
undergraduate studies.
Let's talk
about your work as an Activist. How did that come by? What is your core work in
the field?
Having been a vibrant activist and social change
thought leader during my undergraduate years, I made a personal strategic
choice to continue with my contribution to the gender equality and women’s
empowerment field even after completion. I joined Dandelion Kenya in 2012 where
I worked on enabling access to sexual and reproductive health and rights
information and services to adolescent girls, young people and women. This was
through comprehensive sexuality education under our I Choose, My Life program
implemented in schools to target young people in school aged 13-20years,
creating channels for referrals and engaging in HIV Prevention work through
community engagement and campaigning. One of the critical areas I have worked on
is safe abortion advocacy. This experience coupled with the intensive movement
building involved provided a platform to move from just being a gender equality
advocate to self-identification as a feminist. In particular recognizing the
patriarchal structures (sex, class, sexual orientation, gender identity and
disability status) amongst others. I also use social media to accelerate
information sharing, movement building and for advocacy. It is under my social
media work that I founded the hashtag #SRHRDialogues where organizations and
individuals can advance a constructive
discourse on SRHR and engage in structured advocacy, the hashtag has since been
democratized and is used by various organizations without regulation.
You are also
a Women Deliver Young Leader and an SDG5 activist. Can you share more about
your choice of activism for gender equality, and how you contribute to it?
As a feminist, I make a commitment to engage in
activism and programming that bridges gaps, reclaims agency and amplifies
voices of those left behind. I do this by promoting women and girls health and
providing information while recognizing the factors and structures that slow
progress. Using the contextual community
projects I work with to involve girls, I provide the global policy space with
contextual input that propel the global policy advocacy efforts forward, I also
bring to the table the voices of the women and girls I work with to ensure that
their voices are reflected and their agency amplified beyond the community
setting. In galvanizing young women’s voices through online campaigns such as
#WhatWomenWant, we not only enable movement building amongst disenfranchised
populations, but also offer young feminist leadership that shapes global policy
advocacy on issues such as the HIV Response and maternal health. My
contribution is enabled and grounded by own personal experiences growing up in
a slum (bringing to the table the voices of my friends deceased from maternal
mortality and HIV/AIDS and those who could not complete school due to teenage
pregnancy). This is further reinforced by the young women and girls who
constantly seek better by participating in our programs and contributing to our
online dialogues and partners who support our social media work.
What does
your role as a Mandela Fellow entail?
The Mandela fellowship is a US state department
program under Presidents Obama’s Young African Leaders Initiative. Started in
2014, the program is aimed at investing in Young African Leaders on the areas
of Civic Leadership, Public Management, Business and Entrepreneurship and
Energy. Across the continent more than
50,000 applied for just 1000positions. For my fellowship, I was placed at
University of California, Berkeley, Goldman School of Public Policy. At the
school, I studied various topics on leadership, inequality, gender diversity,
public policy. I was placed for Followship at the City of Berkeley, Health,
Housing and Community Services department where I learnt various skills under
the mentorship of the director who contributed greatly into providing insights
on how to reconcile ideals and navigating systems. As a Mandela
fellow, I am part of a class of 1000 young African leaders identified as change
makers on the continent by driving community projects and influencing change in
various ways. My selection is based on my gender equality and feminist activism
and going through the program has facilitated my feminist growth driving me to
become more pluralistic.
What have
your key challenges been, on your journey as an activist? How have you, or are
you working, to overcome them?
Key among the
challenges has been Funding,
capacity, structures and multiple levels of operations for a community
activist. All of these have clearly called for us to be innovative and it is
one of the reasons social media became an avenue and platform for us to engage
given that it does not require a lot of funding. Relying on volunteer labour
has been key when operating within contexts with capacity gaps. What has been
helpful is the utilization of the wide networks we have developed to navigate
the multi layered levels of operations. Sharing our work with partners and
piggy backing on our allies platforms has provided an avenue to not only scale
up our work but also enhance our visibility at the global level. It is on this
premise that we believe anchoring our work within a feminist discourse and
being strategic in pursuing partnerships has been of key value. Religious and cultural fundamentalism and
instance of cyber violence are some of the other challenges. With this, I have
relied on my feminist network and sisters to help grow my personal feminist
discourse and not shy away from taking on the political stance of being an
African feminist. This means constantly interrogating my feminist ideals and
checking in with sisters from whose support I thrive. I have also tried to
constantly give visibility to the gendered digital divide as a political issue
and the articulation of cyber violence as a component of violence against
women.
What inspires
you most? What keeps you going?
Despite the challenges there has been immeasurable success and moments
to be inspired. Most of these moments represent a nexus between my own personal
and professional journeys. For example, implementing the I choose, My Life comprehensive
sexuality education program for 4 years, I witnessed first-hand as girls agency
was built, they blossomed before my eyes as they received more information and
got more involved in challenging patriarchy at levels of their engagement. This
also involved adding their voices onto community projects and lading change on
issues such as challenging female genital mutilation and child marriage. Those
experiences of seeing girls rise up to challenge patriarchy from an early age
inspire me, seeing girls boldly articulate their vision to leaders and inject
their voice into political discourse. Its those stories of girls succeeding
despite odds that drive me. However most importantly is the fact, a girl who is
15, 12 or 16 might be going through what I went through compounded by the policy gaps, socio
cultural, financial and infrastructural barriers that compel me to act.
