Democratic space

Articles


Sudan’s Civil Society - Aspirant Revolutionaries Once More

Published: 26 April 2019
Article
Civil society has always played a key role in Sudan’s long ongoing struggle for political reform and the National Congress Party, which has ruthlessly clung to power for nearly 30 years, is cognisant of this.     Very few political analysts could have predicted what has transpired in Sudan over the past four months. On 19 December, a small protest ostensibly over a treble price hike in bread triggered a domino effect of protests across the country, including in former ruling party strongholds. It soon became clear the initial protests lit a powder keg within Sudanese society, frustrated at 30 years of authoritarian rule with mass corruption and an unwieldy security apparatus --Sudanese citizenry have had enough.
Saba saba demonstrations in Nakuru - 7 Jul 2025 Newspapers for sale displayed on a stand ahead of Saba Saba demonstrations in Nakuru.

Victims First. Action Now: Kenya Must End Enforced Disappearances

Published: 24 September 2026
For families of people who have been forcibly disappeared in Kenya, the search for answers can stretch for years. As the country marks 20 years since the adoption of the international convention on enforced disappearances, Shukri Wachu the National Coordinator of the Missing Voices Coalition, examines Kenya’s record, the urgent need for accountability, and what ratification could mean for victims and their families.
Memory Across Borders: A Conversation on History and Reparative Justice

Listening Across Oceans: Memory, Restitution, and the Unfinished Journey Home

Published: 20 August 2026
Article
Tanzanian heritage scholar Bernard Laulian Ntahondi shares his reflections as a panellist at a June 2026 event hosted by the Heinrich Böll Foundation in Berlin. The panel focused on the film “Listening Across Oceans,” which follows a Berlin school group’s visit to the USA to examine the transatlantic enslavement trade.   Bernard is a member of Ajabu Ajabu, a cinema and artists’ collective in Dar es Salaam committed to preserving and promoting Tanzania’s audiovisual heritage. He also serves as a curator at the Dar es Salaam Centre for Architectural Heritage, where he focuses on the city’s architectural legacy.
Youth protest in Kenya . Photo by storyzangu

We must confront Police Abuse in Kenya Ahead of 2027

Published: 13 April 2026
Article
As Kenya approaches a critical electoral period, concerns over police abuse and the erosion of civic freedoms are becoming increasingly urgent. Despite constitutional guarantees, many young people continue to face violence and repression when exercising their rights, reflecting a troubling pattern of impunity. Drawing on recent cases and the findings of the Missing Voices 2025 report, this piece examines the scale of the crisis and calls for accountability, justice, and sustained collective action.
Javan Ofula
Unbowed for Justice

POLICE KILLINGS INCREASE BY 20% IN 2025 AMID PROTEST CRACKDOWN

Published: 24 March 2026
Article
The 2025 Missing Voices Annual Report reveals a troubling paradox: while overall violations declined, police killings rose sharply by 20%, with young men, especially in Nairobi, bearing the brunt of this violence. Most deaths occurred during protest periods, underscoring persistent concerns about the use of excessive force by law enforcement. Although enforced disappearances dropped significantly, weak legal frameworks and limited accountability mechanisms continue to deny justice to victims and their families, raising urgent questions about policing, civic space, and human rights in Kenya.

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Publications


Unbowed for Justice MV Report 2025

Unbowed for Justice

Published: 30 March 2026
The 2025 Missing Voices Annual Report documents 131 cases of extrajudicial killings and enforced disappearances in Kenya, reflecting an overall decline in violations compared to 2024. However, this apparent progress masks a worrying trend: a sharp rise in police killings and continued concerns about the use of excessive force, particularly during periods of public protest.
MV Report launch 2024_ Cover page

Missing Voices Annual Report 2024 | Brutal Policing

Published: 7 May 2025
Missing Voices documented a total of 159 cases of extrajudicial killings and enforced disappearances in 2024. Out of the 159 cases, 104 (65%) were incidents of police-related killings, while 55 (35%) were those of enforced disappearances. 2024 marked the year that the coalition recorded the highest number of cases of enforced disappearances. Before then, 2019 had the highest number of cases of enforced disappearances at 38.  
MV 2023 Report cover page

Missing voices Annual Report 2023 | End Police Impunity

Published: 30 April 2024
Publication
On Wednesday, April 24th, 2024, the Missing Voices Coalition launched its 2023 Annual Report focused on the theme "End Police Impunity" at the Heinrich Boell Foundation, Nairobi Office. This marks the fourth report and a significant achievement for the Coalition since its inception. The report highlighted several key developments related to discussions on police impunity in the country for the year 2023. One major highlight was the reduction in extrajudicial killings and enforced disappearances compared to the previous year. The report detailed a 9.2% decrease in extrajudicial killings, from 130 in 2022 to 118 in 2023, and a 54.5% decrease in enforced disappearances, from 22 in 2022 to 10 in 2023.
MV report 2022

Missing Voices 2022 annual report : Accountability Now

Published: 30 September 2023
Publication
The 2022 report was launched on Friday 24th March 2023 , held in Yala, marked the launch of the Accountability report, shedding light on the Statistics and Trends of Extrajudicial Killings and Enforced Disappearances in the country. The launch included a panel discussion by partners and keynote addresses by distinguished guests that include Ambassadors from Germany, Britain, the United States, and the European Union.

Pandemic policing accessibility of COVID-19 prevention measures in Kenya’s urban informal settlements

Published: 22 August 2022
Research Paper
This paper seeks to explore the topographies of abandonment and pandemic policing in Kenya’s urban-informal settlements. Through a connection of spatial territories1, I explore the continuation of the colonial era divide and rule tactics to govern what seems as Kenya’s fragmented regions through the duration of the government COVID-19 combatting mechanisms. Through ethnographic research, this paper tries to connect the struggles of Kenya’s poor urban populations secluded in ‘slum areas’ on their daily quest for survival by engaging in a fight against a pandemic and state violence. Notwithstanding the daily denials of basic needs and priorities by both government and potential de facto urban management.
Missing Voices report Launch 2022

#DelayedJustice. Missing voices annual report 2021

Published: 27 April 2022
New Publication
Missing Voices is a coalition of 15 Civil Society Organizations that aim to end extrajudicial killings and enforced disappearances in Kenya. Since its inception in August 2018, Missing Voices has documented and verified data on police killings and enforced disappearances (EDs) and held several campaigns to disseminate our research while pushing the general public to report incidents of police misconduct. These activities are done in partnership with stakeholders with the mission to get justice for victims and survivors and promote police accountability.
Missing Voices Annual Report 2020 Cover Page

The Brutal Pandemic

Published: 1 April 2021
Annual Report
Kenya has a long history of police use of excessive force during law enforcement operations, either in informal settlements or in response to demonstrations, often resulting in unnecessary deaths.  Several deaths from police violence were reported in 2020 during the first  days of  Kenya's dawn to dusk curfew imposed on March 27,2020 to contain the spread of  COVID-19.

Perspectives #03/2018: Through the Looking Glass: Images of African Futures

Published: 7 January 2019
The Hollywood action movie Black Panther captured the imagination of audiences around the globe. In several African countries, it quickly became the highest grossing film of all time. The tale is set in Wakanda, a technologically advanced African kingdom that avoided the shackles of colonialism and slavery by isolating itself behind a guise of poverty and deprivation. Although what it presents as “African”, in terms of narrative and images, is far from uncontested, the film catapulted Afrofuturism – a discipline or aesthetic that enlists science fiction and technology to imagine black identities and futures unconstrained by past and present circumstances – from the avant-garde circles of artists and intellectuals into the mainstream.

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