Muleta Kapatiso – Women Deliver

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2020

Muleta Kapatiso

  • Age: 31
  •    |   He/him/his

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Human rights are central to the realization of gender equality, youth participation in decision making, and the protection of young people's sexual and reproductive health and rights. Our advocacy on gender equality is about preserving human dignity. Like any other progressive human endeavor, our cause and programming around gender equality should have frequent monitoring and evaluation to ascertain wins and the unintended results that can potentially be disastrous for the equal world we want to create for ourselves and hopefully, for the generations to come.

- Muleta Kapatiso

Bio

Muleta Kapatiso is a lawyer and activist, a graduate from the University of Lusaka where he obtained a Bachelor of Laws Degree (LLB) and is currently pursuing a Master of
Laws in Constitutional and Administrative Law (LLM) at the same university. Muleta also does consultancy work on human rights, law and policy reform, artistic freedom, development and general research. Muleta is currently employed as a legal officer at Chapter One Foundation, a top tier strategic interest litigation and human rights organisation in Zambia, where his work has a focus on law reform, human rights, constitutional law, research and preparing documents for litigation and dispute resolution, helping clients meet their goals. Prior to joining the team, Muleta worked as a learner legal practitioner at Undikumbukire Project Zambia on the European Union PLEED
Project focusing on offering legal services to persons in incarceration especially juveniles in conflict with the law. As part of his work to advance human rights and the rule of law, Muleta serves as regional council member on the Youth4UHC movement hosted at Y-Act in Kenya, steering committee member of the Fight Inequality Alliance Zambia and legal resource person of the Youth4Parliament movement a social movement championing for meaningful participation of the youth in politics and leadership in Zambia. Muleta is also Co-Founder of Friends of Inmates Zambia, a human rights organisation with a focus on the rights of marginalised communities.

What ignited your pursuit for gender equality?

I realized growing up with my sisters and a widowed mother that being a woman or girl comes with its own multifaceted challenges and inequalities. I later realized that for girls and women in rural areas or prisons, the fact that they have various needs and rights is not considered. This ignited my passion for human rights. We need to start addressing issues of gender inequality especially among marginalized populations in prisons and we need to start this from a human rights and human dignity perspective.

Please share your biggest wins as an advocate for gender equality.

Being able to hold focus group discussions in prison still remains my biggest win, it opened a door for under gender equality from a different view and from a human rights perspective. The second would be working with the team at my work place to address gender equality issues from strategic public interest litigation through national level courts and seeing it go all the way to regional tribunal.

Outside of your gender equality advocacy work, what do you enjoy doing?

In my spare time, I enjoy doing physical exercises, connecting with friends, learning how to play a piano, and reading books.

Languages Spoken:

  • English (Advanced/Native)
  • Lozi (Advanced/Native)
  • Mbunda (Advanced/Native)
  • Bemba (Intermediate)
  • Nyanja (Intermediate)
  • Luvale (Elementary)
  • Nkoya(Elementary)