Young Leaders Think Tank Second Residential Workshop - Foundation Office Uganda and South Sudan
Event Reports
The Young Leaders Think Tank for Policy Alternative is an initiative of KAS to give highly qualified young people a platform to strengthen youth participation in governance and politics. These young experts come together to analyse policy issues and to formulate policy alternatives. Their aim is to reach political decision makers with their analysis in order to develop policies which focus on the problems of the youth. A working group of the Think Tank has been doing research on the topic of how the free movement of labour under the Common Market Protocol (CMP) of the EAC was implemented in Uganda and how the youth benefits from it.
After a short welcoming speech by the country representative Mr. Mathias Kamp the speaker of the EAC-working group, Mr. Emmanuel Kitamirike, gave an introduction to their research results. All Think Tank members had the possibility to give feedback and comments or to ask questions which was coordinated by Ms. Anna Hoffmann and Mr. Jasper Oketa. Because of the broad research opportunities the CMP provides, the participants focused on the scope and finalized the draft structure given by the working group. The members identified four different research areas which needed to be discussed in more detail – background of the EAC integration process, analysis of the labour policies in Uganda, labour market situation in Uganda compared to other EAC member states and the EU and analysis of the political will. In order to provide deeper background information and reliable findings, the group was divided in four working groups. Before lunch time all members had some space for individual studies concerning their research areas.
Following the working groups discussed their findings. To exchange the results of the working groups, the café methodology was used. All working groups chose one representative who presented their results to members of the other groups by a rotation system.
On the second workshop day all working group representatives presented their finding including all additional comments given by other group members during the café methodology session. The Think Tank members had a lively discussion on which data should be used. Due to the lack of reliable data sources the participants agreed on using a combination of official date and selected data provided by NGOs and other institutions.
To push the paper forward, the working groups will provide a summarized analysis of their results by beginning of next week which will be part of the final paper.
We thank all participants for the lively discussions and their contribution to formulate a knowledgeable analysis of the impact of free movement of labour within the EAC on the situation of the youth in Uganda.
Author: Nele Krüger, KAS Intern
