| CRIP to take up the issue of stateless people as one of its programmatic priorities, that the denial of nationality is a major violation of human rights which affects people in every region and all of us are potential candidates. Therefore, ought to take up the plight of stateless persons as this struggle reflects our cardinal universal principles and values: that a human being has the right to life, liberty and security; the right to education, equal protection under the law, and to be free from slavery and torture; the right to freedom of thought, conscience, and religion, and to freedom of opinion and expression; and the right to a nationality. Stateless persons are denied all of these rights and are unrecognized by any nation. As a result, not only are stateless persons denied their rights and faced with living in discrimination, but their situation is rarely recognized by mainstream society. The feeling of being invisible leads to a debilitating sense of desperation. As a result of their plight, many stateless persons are forced to cross international borders and become refugees which Uganda is hosting a large number. At the community level, the initiative will work to strengthen people’s capacity to understand, claim, and exercise their fundamental rights, including access to education, health care, employment, property, and freedom of movement. It will also amplify the voices of those most at risk of statelessness, particularly in rural, isolated, and border areas where access to documentation remains a major challenge. The alliance acts in mobilizing its collective knowledge, skills, expertise, influence and power. |
