The Project
For some years Libera has decided to appear in Africa, an enormous continent that has wide historical, social and economic differences, in which are constantly growing criminal phenomena with more or less evident mafiosi traits, in addition to endemic corruption and negative stereotypes dictated by the phenomenon of migration and beyond.
At the same time, there are associations and movements that from local to international action are dedicated to building possible alternatives to criminal violence and that have the skills and the ability to tell us the other side of that great land of peoples that represents the African continent. A path that wants to get rid of easy simplifications and stereotypes that too often create a common misconception about what is related to a criminal and mafia phenomenon and what not. A path that wants to shed light on who every day is an alternative to criminal violence in that great land of peoples that represents the African continent.
FREE TOGETHER
We, the organizations of the PLACE Network ʹ Peace and Liberation in Africa through Change and Engagement have gathered in Grand Bassam, Côte d’Ivoire for our 1st Assembly (May 23-27, 2023) to declare our common commitment to contributing to the sustainable development and social justice of a self-reliant African continent within a context of Peace, Non-Violence, Equity, and free of Insecurity, Racism Corruption and Bad Governance.
FINAL DECLARATION
Grand Bassam, Côte d’Ivoire | May 23-27, 2023
We also reaffirm the values underpinning our work as a network:
– Respect: the value of protecting and strengthening the capacities of the nations and grassroots movements of Africa to deal with emerging threats to the cherished cultures, laws, religions, and traditional family values of Africans. This means respect for African cultures, traditions and environments.
– Solidarity and dignity: PLACE Network believes in and defends human dignity and responsible solidarity as essential values for individuals and for the network.
Our Network stands against insecurity, corruption, bad governance and racism. Our work will aim at:
- Encouraging a culture of democratic legality and justice, transparency, access to public information, accountability and responsibility in the defense, promotion and respect of human rights, while also considering
progress made through legal systems and necessary legislative changes; - Creating effective alternatives to allow for a dignified life and decent work for young people and women, who live in vulnerable contexts and come into contact with crime and violence every day, through literacy,
education, the arts and sports in peaceful, non-violent and human rights-based processes; - Fostering construction of active citizenship in the context of international solidarity, combining experience and methodologies for the defense and reporting of violations of rights, acts of corruption and violence caused by organized crime, and the actions and omissions for which states are responsible;
- Generating collective actions to aid in filing reports, accessing justice, and supporting and guaranteeing full compensation and measures to ensure the non-recurrence of damage, as well as providing specialized
psychosocial attention to victims and their families in the face of acts carried out by transnational criminal organizations, the exploitation of natural resources, land seizures, and other forms of environmental crimes; - Promoting coordination by fostering collaboration between associations and their institutions at a national (through the creation and strengthening of national networks), regional and international level.
place – Peace and Liberation in Africa through Change and Engagement
A network of 39 partners from 16 countries: Ivory Coast, Democratic Republic of Congo, Nigeria, Senegal, Kenya, Rwanda, Uganda, South Sudan, Malawi, Mozambique, Zambia, Tanzania, Guinea-Bissau, Mali, Cameroon, Benin, Zimbabwe.
main areas of intervention
- Restorative justice, memory and support for victims
- Corruption, investigative journalism and freedom of expression
- Promotion and protection of human rights
- Protection of the environment and ancestral communities as a strategy to combat land grabbing and extractivism
- Trafficking and trafficking
- Prevention in terms of educational, cultural, sporting, artistic paths, all with a gender perspective.
Libera. Associazioni, nomi e numeri contro le mafie, born in 1995, is a network of associations, social cooperatives, movements and groups, schools, trade unions, scout groups involved in the commitment not only against mafias, corruption, crime and those who feed them, but also strongly for the social justice, the search of truth e a living and sharing memory.
It is present throughout Italy in 20 regional coordination groups, 83 provincial coordination groups and 304 local groups.