The Whitaker Peace & Development Initiative (WPDI) is pleased to announce its renewed partnership with the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) to provide psychosocial support to children and youth residents of a camp for persons displaced by the civil war in South Sudan through the form of an in-kind grant. The camp, PoC (Protection of Civilians) III is located in Juba, the capital of South Sudan, which has often been the epicenter of the conflict between opposed factions within the country’s leadership.
WPDI and USAID have worked together since 2016 in South Sudan, specifically at the PoC site in Juba. Due to the concern that young people frustrated by plight would turn to violence, WPDI established peace education programs there focused around the power of sports and cinema to build attitudes conducive to peace and reconciliation. Through Peace through Sports and Cinema for Peace, more than 20,000 residents have participated in our programs. WPDI staff on the ground in Juba report that they are both very popular and have both reduced levels of tensions and violence as well as have been fully embraced within the camp.
In recognition of our successful work, USAID elected to contribute sports equipment, dignity kits for girls, t-shirts, and other support to our efforts on the ground in South Sudan. This will allow WPDI to help transform the daily lives of thousands of persons impacted by conflict. In particular, USAID’s support will help us organize events that will reach thousands of camp residents such as sports tournaments, cultural performances, educational campaigns, and community dialogues.
We expect this partnership to contribute to WPDI’s efforts to build peace in South Sudan. It will allow us to increase interactions between male and female youths from different communities within the PoC camp which, in turn, will help our expert staff better understand underlying social needs there. Through doing so, we hope to build more peaceful attitudes and behaviors that will be conducive to our work, thereby growing our already substantial impact on the ground.