For Two District Assemblies In Northern Region.

WANEP Ghana (GHANEP) with sponsorship from UNICEF has facilitated a peacebuilding/human security training for two districts of the Northern Region. The two districts are the Tamale Metropolitan Assembly and the Yendi Municipal Assembly. The training forms part of the human security programme of the UN for Northern Ghana which was launched in 2009 by His Excellency, the Vice President of the Republic of Ghana in Tamale. It aims at reducing violence, the negative effects of violent conflicts, building local capacity among members of the assemblies for peace and drawing up strategies which would ensure that peacebuilding and conflict prevention efforts are mainstreamed into the Medium Term development plans of four assemblies in the Northern, Upper East and West regions. The programme also aims at consolidating past and existing efforts of peacebuilding and conflict prevention efforts by both civil society and state actors. The purpose of the two day training for each assembly was to allow for the communities within the districts to come up with their own strategies and interventions on peace building/conflict resolution and human security initiatives that would be mainstreamed into the medium term development plans of the District Assemblies. It was also to allow communities to develop their Community Action Plans (CAPs) to enhance human security. Activities during the workshops included presentations on issues of Human Security, concepts of conflict, the constitutes of violence and how to respond and early warning signals of conflict and what to do with such information. Participants also undertook group discussions and developed Community Action Plan (CAP) for their communities. The training in Yendi was attended by over 70 participants including assembly members, chiefs, community members from five communities namely Guntingli, Balogu, Kumfong, Nayilifon and Zohe whiles that of Tamale was attended by over 73 participants from decentralized departments of the Metropolitan Assembly and from five communities namely Changli, Nyohini, Lamashegu, Aboabo and Choggu.

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Community members preparing their community plans

Participants listening to a presentation by WANEP Ghana