From Responsibility to Response: Assessing National - Brookings

CHAPTER 1 Assessing National Approaches to Internal Displacement: Findings from 15 Countries
intergovernmental conference on internal displacement,
the government openly discussed its efforts and
the bureaucratic challenges that it has faced in coordinating
its response to internal displacement. 14
In Kenya, the government’s recognition of internal
displacement and its responsibility for awarenessraising
are reflected in the draft National Policy for the
Prevention of Internal Displacement and the Protection
and Assistance to Internally Displaced Persons in Kenya,
as well as in press releases, statements, and reports and
in the development of ministerial institutions focusing
on internal displacement. 15 The draft policy, developed
in partnership with the Office of the Representative
of the UN Secretary-General on the Human Rights of
IDPs, includes provisions for raising awareness among
IDPs (including illiterate IDPs) of their rights, entitlements,
and judicial remedies and of the policy itself; it
also calls for informing all actors involved of the rights
of IDPs, including in particular law enforcement and
state security agencies. 16 The government states as
one of the policy’s objectives “the raising of awareness
of their [IDPs’] rights” and states its commitment “to
14 Brookings-Bern Project on Internal Displacement,
Regional Seminar on Internal Displacement in the Southern
African Development Community (SADC) Region,
Gaborone, Botswana, 24–26 August 2005 (www.brookings.
edu/events/2005/0826_southern_africa.aspx).
15 “National Policy for Protecting and Assisting Internally
Displaced Persons in Kenya,” speech of Minister of State
for Special Programmes at the Workshop on the National
Internally Displaced Persons Policy, 17 March 2010 (www.
sprogrammes.go.ke/index.php?option=com_content&
task=view&id=321&Itemid=117); “National Policy for
Protecting and Assisting Internally Displaced Persons
in Kenya,” Speech of Permanent Secretary, Ministry of
Justice, National Cohesion and Constitutional Affairs,
Workshop on the National Internally Displaced Persons
Policy, 17 March 2010 (www.sprogrammes.go.ke/index.
php?option=com_content&task=view&id=322&Item
id=96).
16 Government of the Republic of Kenya, National Policy on
the Prevention of Internal Displacement and the Protection
and Assistance to Internally Displaced Persons in Kenya,
final consolidated draft (24 March 2010), chapters IV,
VIII, and IX. Draft on file with the authors.
36
prevent and avoid conditions that are conducive to or
have the potential of resulting in the displacement of
persons,” including by “promoting an understanding
among the public at large of the phenomenon of internal
displacement and its social, economic, political and
legal consequences for the individual, the community
and the country.” 17 The policy also includes provisions
concerning public awareness of evacuations, preventing
the spread of contagious and infectious diseases such as
HIV/AIDS and malaria among displaced populations,
environmental awareness-raising to protect water resources,
and the prevention of natural disasters through
environmental destruction.
In the Central African Republic, where in 2010 the government
began the process of developing a draft IDP law,
the National Standing Committee for IDPs established
by the president is charged with conducting activities
to raise awareness of displacement, including by holding
training sessions on the issue, on humanitarian law,
and on the Guiding Principles as well as by mounting
broader public campaigns. 18 These provisions are in line
with the Model Legislation on the Implementation of
the Protocol on Protection and Assistance to Internally
Displaced Persons annexed to the ICGLR Protocol on
the Protection and Assistance to Internally Displaced
Persons (2006). 19 Information on any such activity of
the Standing Committee could not be identified. Before
the establishment of the Standing Committee, the gov-
17 Ibid., “Objectives,” p. 9; Ibid., Chapter IV, 3(i).
18 In French, the committee is called Comité National
Permanent de Concertation et de Coordination pour la
Gestion de la Protection des Droits des Personnes Déplacées.
It was established by the Central African Republic’s High
Commissioner for Human Rights and Good Governance
in 2009 to coordinate the national response to internal
displacement.
19 Article S.6(10) and (11) of the Model Legislation,
discussed in Erin Mooney’s legal audit of laws in the
Central African Republic relating to IDPs, Examen du
cadre normatif de la République Centrafricaine relatif à
la protection des personnes déplacées à l’intérieur de leur
propre pays (available in French only), Brookings-Bern
Project on Internal Displacement, February 2011, p. 20
(www.brookings.edu/idp).