Wevyn Muganda
Kenya
Founder of Arctive Citizens and Beyond the Lines
Profile
Wevyn Muganda comes from Mombasa, Kenya. She is the founder of Arctive Citizens, a civic tech platform that empowers and amplifies citizens’ agency in governance, peacebuilding, community initiatives, and decision-making processes. Arctive Citizens emphasises public education and community engagement and provides a platform that connects citizens to tools, resources, and networks for civic engagement. Previously she founded the organisation Beyond the Lines, a platform that focused on promoting human rights education and active citizenship as a way of preventing violent extremism. Storytelling lies at the heart of the organisation, and it is used as a strategy to educate youth about counter-terrorism and the consequences of joining violent groups.
Wevyn has been working in New York as a Peacebuilding Fellow of the Global Network of Women Peacebuilders, focusing primarily on creating more spaces for women and LGBTQIA+ youth to be involved as decision-makers in peacebuilding processes. Wevyn also co-led Mutual Aid Kenya, a response programme to COVID-19 that built a volunteer network all over Kenya and supported over 3,000 families during the crisis. She is currently active as a Youth Advisor at UNICEF Generation Unlimited. Wevyn has been nominated for multiple awards such as the Global Woman of Choice Awards 2021, and she won the She Can Award in 2019. She is an alumna of the Young Africa Leaders Initiative Nairobi and the Mandela Washington Fellowship programmes, sponsored by the U.S. Embassy. She has a bachelor’s in Actuarial Sciences and graduated from the Leadership, Organising, and Action program at Harvard Kennedy School, U.S. She is also a 2023 GRO GEST Fellow in International Gender Studies at the University of Iceland.
Story
In addition to being a peacebuilder and a social justice activist, Wevyn Muganda said she sees herself as a community organiser. ‘The best way to build peace is when you are not doing it on behalf of someone.’ Besides organising people to take political action, Wevyn educates youth on topics such as political rights, human rights, and (preventing) violent extremism through her organisation Beyond the Lines. She said she focuses on young people with low levels of literacy from her local community. She tries to simplify complex security materials as a ‘way to reduce the elitism around the space.’ Wevyn said that in peacebuilding, it is important ‘to appeal to people’s hearts and minds.’ She uses storytelling to do this, and with her stories she creates an emotional connection between the people and the conflict. She said these stories ‘would get young men tearing up and wanting to change. It’s one of the ways we used to disengage young people from gangs.’
Wevyn grew up in Mombasa, Kenya, where she became aware of the injustices her community was facing at a young age. She said she first ‘felt a lot of anger because of how the state was behaving towards people like me. But as time went by, [I feel a] lot of hope as well. The change that I want to see is coming, it’s slow, but it is coming.’ Wevyn said that in her initiatives to bring change to the world, she sometimes faces challenges such as funding and ageism. She also struggles with how little support there is for peacebuilders and activists. She said, ‘You're always looking out for everyone else, but no one is ever looking out for you and how you survive. So many people are struggling with their mental health because you have to take care of a struggling community, even as your own life is hanging by the thread.’ She said that another challenge she faces as a Black, young woman is tokenism. ‘I think that many people invite me to conferences and spaces because they want this Black woman to speak so that they can say that there was a Black woman who spoke. You know, it doesn’t feel good when you know you’re just a tick in the box,’ she said.
Wevyn said what keeps her going despite these challenges is her community. ‘For me, community is everything. It’s all I’ve ever had, and it’s all I have.’ She also finds support in the global community that she has become a part of, while also remaining grounded in local community activities. Wevyn said she strives to see change happen for her people and community. She encourages the notion of ‘the everyday kind of activism’, where the choices and decisions that one makes – how one talks to people and how one approaches life – all ultimately have an effect on peace. Wevyn works hard through multiple initiatives to organise young people to reach ‘a united front’. She said this is because, ‘if we’re not all speaking the same language of equality, then we will never have peace.’