Human Rights Festival Sarawak 2023 to be held at La Promenade Mall from Dec 9-10

The organising members showing some of the souvenirs, posters, medals and booklets that will be available at the two-days event.

KUCHING, Dec 1: The Human Rights Festival Sarawak 2023 (HRFS 2023) will be held at La Promenade Mall from Dec 9-10.

The event, from 10am to 9pm on both days, is jointly organised by a group of Sarawak non-governmental organisations (NGOs) and civil society organisations (CSOs).

About 15 participating NGOs will set up booths to showcase their advocacy or human rights work. Visitors will be given a booklet with a map of the booths.

Those who are able to obtain stamps from all the booths will receive an exclusive limited edition medal for their collection, limited to 200 per day.

There will also be T-shirts for the event on sale and other fun activities, including Zumba by Zin Vanessa and Damien from ‘The Stage Studio’.

Among other programmes lined up are documentary and film screenings, including a session showcasing Sarawakian filmmaker Albert Bansa, who will be screening ‘Pengidup Aku’, a talk on ‘Sarawak Delineation’ by Rise of Social Efforts (ROSE), discussions on anti-trafficking and gender rights by Purple Lily, and an awareness talk on ‘Stigma and Discrimination Against People Living with HIV’ by the Sarawak AIDS Concern Society.

Human Rights Day is celebrated worldwide on Dec 10 every year to commemorate the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR) proclaimed by the United Nations General Assembly in Paris on Dec 10, 1948.

The declaration called for fundamental human rights — regardless of race, colour, religion, sex, language, political or other opinion, national or social origin, property, birth or other status — to be universally protected.

This year marks the 75th anniversary of the declaration with the theme ‘Dignity, Freedom, and Justice for All’.

This upcoming event at La Promenade Mall is a collective effort by a group of NGOs in Sarawak that come together to celebrate these universal rights with the public in the Kuching/Samarahan area.

The different participating NGOs have planned many activities to raise awareness among the public on the importance and significance of human rights.

For more details on the planned programme and activities, members of the public are encouraged to follow Instagram @hrfswk2023. — DayakDaily