The Centre for Accountability and Rule of Law (CARL) is an independent, not-for-profit organization working towards a just society for all persons in Sierra Leone through monitoring, advocacy for institutional transparency, capacity building and empowerment of citizens. CARL monitors key national institutions including the courts (both at the formal and informal level), the Anti-Corruption Commission, the Human Rights Commission, and also follows up on the recommendations of the country’s Truth and Reconciliation Commission. The monitoring of these institutions has, however, over the years been limited mainly to district headquarter towns.
Apart from outreach activities conducted in rural communities, effective monitoring of human rights issues has been periodic in most rural localities. This was largely due to logistical constraints and paucity of personnel with the requisite skills resident in those communities. In a bid to effectively tackle the growing human rights problems in communities in the northern part of the country, CARL took the bold step to introduce community-led monitoring of human rights related issues. This approach is ideal in the current circumstance: Firstly, it is cost-effective and secondly, it maximizes output. It has been introduced in six communities in two chiefdoms in the Bombali District. The communities are Makump Bana, Mateneh, and Maboleh in the Bombali Shebora chiefdom and Yeli Sanda, Masongbo and Panlap in the Makarie Gbanti chiefdom.
CARL’s Local Monitors, during a training session for CSOs and CBOs
Since the end of the civil war, there have been lots of reforms of state institutions throughout the country, including the justice sector. Some laws have been repealed, others have been amended and in some instances, new ones have been enacted. Of particular note are the three gender laws and the child rights law. Simply put, there has been conscious attempt to bring the country in tune with international best practices. Despite this laudable development within the justice sector, much work still needs to be done if it is to impact the poor and vulnerable in rural communities. And, a good starting point is getting rural communities to be aware of the provisions of the laws. Most rural communities are not aware of the existence of these laws, let alone understand the provisions therein. This has posed a huge threat to undermining the efforts of government and its development partners in strengthening good governance and the rule of law in the country.
But CARL monitors cannot do it all by themselves, considering their number in relation to the size of the region. So in May 2011, CARL monitors selected some representatives from the pilot communities listed above, and trained them as community-based human rights monitors. The training was generally based on human rights issues, particularly the gender laws, children’s rights, and sexual and gender based violence. Also, human rights monitoring and reporting was a core training module. They community-based monitors are specifically charged with the responsibility of monitoring, documenting and reporting human rights violations and abuses in their communities.
The training, which is consistent with CARL’s vision and mission, and which is currently being sponsored by Trocaire, has received instant impact. After the exercise, the community-based monitors were presented to their various communities for them to be recognized by community stakeholders. They monitors have been advised to work not as adversaries to the leadership of their various communities, but as partners in addressing serious challenges facing the human rights landscape of the country. Since the introduction of this idea, which is somewhat novelty in the country, there has been an increase in the number of reported cases of human rights violations or abuses in communities in these chiefdoms. During the first few weeks of its inception, our community-based monitors recorded over twenty cases of domestic violence, child pregnancy etc. which were brought to our attention. We immediately took up these matters with the appropriate authorities in the region.
We are currently following up on the minute details of the cases and will remain vigilant until the course of justice is served. Also, quite recently, an alleged child trafficking matter in Sawalia community in the Makarie Gbanti chiefdom was reported to us by our community-based monitors. CARL-SL employees wasted no time in contacting the authorities. To their credit, the authorities made strong efforts at ensuring that the child was rescued. Prior to having community-based monitors, such case would have gone unreported.
Moreover, equipped with the requisite knowledge in human rights, community-based monitors now conduct community sensitization sessions at least once every week. These awareness raising sessions, which focus mainly on women and child rights issues, are held mostly during the congregational prayers on Fridays and Sundays. This is so because in some of the selected communities, community-based monitors double as religious leaders. As such, they use excerpts from their holy books to sensitize community members on human rights provisions.
During their sermons, they discuss the virtues of human rights practices and also the dangers of neglect of human rights standards as a recipe for undermining peace in their various communities. This knowledge is not only benefitting those residents in the selected communities but also those in neighbouring communities who converge in the selected communities for congregational prayers. Besides the multiplying effect of using religious leaders in the sensitization campaign, there has been an increase in trust between duty bearers and right holders in these communities. Community members are now more likely to report cases of domestic violence and abuse of children than before. For instance, between July and August, about twenty-five cases were reported to our community-based monitors in Masongbo in the Makarie Gbanti chiefdom in the Bombali district.
Furthermore, most court officers pay lip service to particularly human rights provisions as enshrined in our laws. They only tend to go by the dictates of human rights provisions when monitors are present during proceedings. When they are not, they are more likely than not to violate the law at will. However, since CARL-SL’s Court Monitors cannot be present in all the courts at the same time, these community-based monitors have come in handy. They have been monitoring court sittings in their various localities especially those involving the rights of women and children. The monitoring reports are sent to CARL monitors on a weekly basis who sort them out in a pecking order for immediate action.
From the foregoing, it is clear that the impact of community-based monitors cannot be overstated. As such, CARL intends to replicate this idea in other communities that it is currently working in the region. With the availability of funds from donors and partners, CARL hopes to continue to train more community-based monitors to effectively and efficiently monitor courts in the rural areas. Without doubt, recruiting and training a band of human rights community monitors across the country could be a major step forward in addressing the numerous human rights challenges confronting Sierra Leone.
