Details

The Ugandan youth constitute an important and significant part of the national population. Statistics show that over 70% of Ugandans are below the age of 35. However, while the young people command a high percentage of the country’s population, their participation in and influence on the governance process remains minimal.

Politically, an overwhelming majority of Uganda’s voting population are youth and by this they present the largest support base for political parties. However, prevailing power relations within major political parties confirm that young people in Uganda are still relegated to peripheral positions. While youth’s dedicated efforts to challenge the status quo have allowed more of them to reach positions of power in recent years and particularly in the 2011 national elections, young people still face significant barriers to their full and equal participation in political structures. Beyond electioneering, the Ugandan youth have not been able to effectively engage and influence the national political agenda be it in government structures or political parties. This state of affairs contradicts an obvious fact that the prevailing youth bulge as well as the several challenges faced by young people in Uganda (including unemployment, poverty, poor quality education and the continuous risk of political violence etc) demands their active involvement in policy matters at all levels and in all structures.

With Uganda’s current multiparty system political parties are fundamental blocks of the national policy and development framework. By this, young people’s effective participation in party affairs becomes crucially important not just for the purpose of enhancing meaningful youth political participation but also for ensuring that policies and positions adopted by political parties address the demands and aspirations of the young generation. It is expected that the political parties would in consequence be able to drive forward internally adopted youth responsive policies and programmes on to the national development agenda.

On the premise of the above background the Konrad-Adenauer-Stiftung has developed a training programme targeting youth leaders from the six parliamentary political parties in Uganda. The parties (in alphabetical order) are: Conservative Party (CP), Democratic Party (DP), Forum for Democratic Change (FDC), Justice Forum (JEEMA), National Resistance Movement (NRM), and Uganda People’s Congress (UPC).

The training content is informed by the programme aim which is to build a pool of youth leaders who can better organise and assume a front seat in driving political party policies, positions and activities. The overall objective is to build a breed of transformative young leaders within and through political parties. This requires that elected youth leaders in parties are able to better organise their groups (party youth wings). They should have a clear understanding of the functions of political parties and the existing gaps in the fulfilment of these functions. In addition the youth have to be aware of the framework for developing party policies and positions. Lastly, they require effective skills in leadership, communication, lobby and advocacy, and organisational management.

In consideration of the above needed interventions, participants in the programme will be opened to a deeper understanding of the roles and functions of political parties in a democratic system. They will in particular be trained to appreciate the meaning and functions of a youth wing in a political party context. It is also designed to train participants on effective mechanisms for organising a party youth wing including leadership and organisational management, team building and membership recruitment. Other aspects to be covered include internal communication within the youth wing as well as communication with other organs within the party. Of significant focus will also be communication with the external public and other stakeholders. In addition, the training programme will cover strategies for reaching out to the electorate beyond elections, use of social media (in particular face book and twitter), and networking. Further more, the programme shall have participants comprehensively trained on lobby and advocacy and in particular on how to influence political party policies and positions. A conclusive component of the training will be to expose participants to the need of a collective framework for promoting youth interests that cuts across party lines in the form of an interparty youth platform.

The workshop will bring together an exclusive number of 20 participants from the six parliamentary parties of Uganda (CP, DP, FDC, JEEMA, NRM & UPC) and the people’s progressive party. Individual participants shall be identified on the basis of them applying to the programme. Applicants shall have to be holding official positions within their party youth wings and will need the written support of their political parties for their applications to be valid.