October 21, 2020 – Last week, youth peacemakers from the Whitaker Peace & Development Initiative (WPDI) conducted the first training workshop for a group of local youths in three counties of South Sudan’s Central Equatoria State. The training – which focused on teaching the local youths new skills in peacebuilding, conflict resolution, business, and entrepreneurship – marked the first of four to come and will ultimately provide them with the ability to help bring positive, transformative change to their communities under the aegis of our youth peacemakers.
Held over a period of five days with strict adherence to COVID-related safety measures, the workshop aimed to start a process under which WPDI’s well-trained youth peacemakers will teach what they learned with us during their one year of intensive training to other youths in their communities – a core component of our Youth Peacemaker Network initiative. Before the workshop commenced, 27 of our youth peacemakers in Central Equatoria State worked for weeks to prepare lesson plans, coordinate logistics, and other elements of the workshop for the hundreds of local youths that planned to attend.
Encouragingly, the 243 local youths representing Yei River, Juba, and Lainya counties attended all five days of the workshop and learned new, basic-level skills in Conflict Resolution Education as well as Business and Entrepreneurship. As a highlight of the workshop, two representatives of the Government of Switzerland in South Sudan Johan Gély, Head of the Swiss International Cooperation for South Sudan, which supports our youth program, and Lydia Minagano, Program Officer at the Embassy of Switzerland, led a session on Conflict Management focusing on appeasement, avoidance, and problem-solving. This initial workshop provided the trainees with a rich foundation for the next phases of their training. By the end of their fourth training, they will have all the tools required to assist our youth peacemakers as they undertake peacebuilding activities and create small businesses, all of which will contribute to strengthen the resilience capacity of their respective communities.
After the workshop concluded, many of our youth peacemakers shared their excitement with us. Frank, a youth peacemaker from Yei River County, told us that “training payam [local] youths, especially in business idea identification, how to develop a business plan, and how to pursue business goals helped me gain confidence for our future work together.” He added that “the training also helped me realize my own teaching skills. I also feel more confident and experienced and look forward to training even more youths in my community.”
As our cohort of youth peacemakers continue to train these 243 local youths in Central Equatoria State, we can only see the prospects for fostering a lasting peace and sustainable development continuing to grow in the coming months. In this critical period, when the political leaders of the country are on the verge of fully implementing the national peace process to end a longstanding civil conflict, the young people will constitute a precious resource to help build a positive future for their communities and South Sudan more largely.
