Karibu Kanaan Music and Art Festival for Peace (KKAMAFP)

The 1st Annual Karibu Kanaan Music and Art Festival (KKAMAFP) took place on October 2nd 2021 in Kisumu, Kenya.
Karibu Kanaan - or Welcome to Kanaan, is a peace festival invented by The Peacemaker Corps Foundation Kenya and +Peace Coalition that intends to create awareness about the value of peace in the context of some of the most pressing local conflict issues. This year's festival sort to find ways of working with youth to understand what is at stake if Kenya was to return to electoral violence, what Kenyans are bound to lose, how they can pull together (Harambee) and what they can do to stop electoral violence in order to imagine how a peaceful and prosperous country would look like with unity (Umoja) and humanity (Ujamaa/Ubuntu) or kannaan/canaan - the promised land. Karibu Kanaan is therefore apolitical and does not subscribe to any factional political interests. Rather, the festival focuses on peacebuilding and national cohesion. ... However, since elections are the most pressing potential conflict issue this year due to ongoing campaigns ahead of 2022 high voltage elections, this inaugural festival chose to sensitise Kenyans about the value of peaceful elections.
Nevertheless, elections are seasonal and consequently, the annual festival will be having rotating thematic areas, again, according to the most pressing local issues in the region that includes: violent extremism, urban crime and violence, natural resource conflicts, drug and alcohol abuse, gender-based violence, mental health and wellness as well as Covid 19 related violence. Next year's theme, for example, will be on Preventing and Countering Violent Extremism (PCVE).
The festival will feature music and art to convey the message that peace is not easily won, but we can do it together. Key talents include; Dj’s for peace, up and coming artists, spoken word poets, theatre groups, artists/painters, community peacebuilders, traditional dancers, and at least one group of established music artists to close down the event with their performances.
The festival will include peacebuilding research designs and methodologies that includes Peace Design Lab, Truth Wire (quasi experimental qualitative survey) and Co-creation Art Build inspired by pan-African decolonial epistemic traditions and intellectual democracy. The festival will begin with a community wide peace march, featuring local partners, including the Kisumu County Government, from the city center to either Mama Grace Onyango Cultural Center or the Jomo Kenyatta Sports Ground (the venue of the event).  

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Peace Design Workshop with Our Partners +Peace

Peace Design Workshop with Our Partners +Peace at the Mama Grace Onyango Cultural Center in Kisumu on the 2nd October 2021.

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Security Committee Planning for Karibu Kanaan Festival

Security Committee Kisumu County Planning Meeting for Karibu Kanaan Music and Art Festival.

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Art BuildUp with Youth Artists

Art BuildUp with youth artists ahead of the Karibu Kanaan Music and Art Festival.

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Traditional Artists
Rehearsals for Karibu Kanaan Music and Arts Festival

Traditional artists rehearsing during the Karibu Kanaan Music and Arts Festival in Kisumu.

Peace Peace Kenya by Braam

Our Vision

The vision of the festival is to inspire local peacebuilders and youth with the message that peace is in their hands to build, especially in moments of conflict and violence.
KKAMAFP captures the memory of peace and helps Kenyans move from negative peace ( which is fragile and merely translates to absence of conflict) to positive peace which is visible and active, transcending individual, community, and national dynamics.

EVERYDAY CULTURE OF NONE VIOLENCE

KKAMAFP will be held annually in collaboration with Mama Grace Onyango Social Center that has signed an MOU with The Peacemaker Corps Foundation Kenya, a coalition member. The festival will be part of the Kisumu City's calendar of activities and will therefore be implemented with the support of Kisumu City and the County Government of Kisumu.
As aforementioned, given that the urgency of Karibu Kanaan Music and Art Festival was informed by the historical problem of electoral violence in Kenya that required agency, it is designed as a launching pad to a one-year campaign towards 2022 elections and beyond.
Its vision is anchored on the desire to nature an everyday culture of non-violence through music, art and film going forward, acting as a creative space for youth imagination, ventilation, engagement and national cohesion through programs such as conflict research, peace literacy for artists, filming, and art fellowships that will benefit the great lakes region. KKAMAFP blends well with a sister program, "Peace in our Cities" that Kisumu City and PCFK are part of.

Venue

The festival will rotate between two venues. The Jomo Kenyatta Sports Ground and the Mama Grace Onyango Social Center's whose Mission is to facilitate activities that promote and nature talent in art, culture, theatre, film, peacebuilding, creative writing and sports for transformative change, especially among the younger generation in the society. Its vision is to be an outstanding and innovative social, cultural and educational centre of excellence within the Lake Victoria basin as well as the Great Lakes Region.

Our Partners

  • +Peace Coalition
  • Mama Grace Onyango Social Center
  • Kisumu County
  • Safaricom
  • The Sentinel Project
  • Stanbic Bank
  • PeaceNet Kenya
  • National Counterterrorism Center
  • Center for Media, Democracy Peace and Security-Rongo University
  • Rongo University
  • Red Cross Kenya
  • Maskani Commons (a digital peacebuilding platform developed in collaboration with BuildUp)
  • Ministry of Devolution's Division of Civic Education and Capacity Building