Conference to Show the Results of the National Campaign to Promote Youth Participation in Local Governance

Aisha Association for Women and Child Protection and PYALARA Organization organize a conference to show the results of the national campaign to promote youth participation in local governance and decision making process in cooperation with Local Government Development Program (LGP) funded from GIZ in coordination with  The Municipal Development and Lending Fund (MDLF) on Wednesday 8/4/2015 in Gaza. 

This conference is one of the activities of those organizations in Youth Create Change (YCC) project which is implementing in 7 Municipalities in the West Bank (Ya'bud, Kafr Al Labd, Bedia, Senjl, Taqoa' and Al Samoua') and 4 Municipalities in Gaza Strip (Rafah, Al Bureij, Deir Al Balah and Al Zahra') in cooperation with Ministry of Local Governance and The Municipal Development and Lending Fund.

Moa'min Abu Nada ,Technical Coordinator in GIZ, opened the conference by showing the main 3 steps which passed in the project that began after a study which discussed with youths in many meetings. The second step is the actual implementation of the project after the orientation to the municipalities who welcomed the idea of the project widely. The third step is the institutionalization of youth in local governance.

Alaa' Meqbel ,the manager of PYALARA- Gaza branch, said: "we have to know that youths need such projects to exchange the talents, increase the experiences and culture  and to promote youth promoters confidence in their abilities and their affiliation". He added that the project is a message should expanded widely because the participation right in all its forms is a right stipulated in the conventions of human rights. 

Sobhi Abu Radwan ,Mayor of Rafah, explained that YCC project is in municipalities and local governance is a pilot project and it is the first time where the opportunity for youth to participate in municipalities and local governance. He stressed that youths are the reason of the nation development, in their hands the construction happened and their embodied creativity. They are the foundation stone in every nook and step of development.

Mariam Abu Al Atta ,the Project manager in Aisha Association for Women and Child Protection, presented the project methodology and explained the idea of the campaign which aimed firstly to improve the services which the municipality supply to the citizen and strengthen the response of the municipalities toward them.

She talked about the most important component and steps of the program which have been through the completion of the projects carried out by youths in various governorate and resulted in many of the positive results which contributed to recognize the capacity of youths, to reach to a large and important role for youths and they are able to submit ideas and projects for the advancement of society and solving problems.

Through the conference, Lana Jaber ,the Project Coordinator Assistant of the YCC Project, presented the most important results of the project, like, the effective role of youths but there is not enough support from the municipalities to develop the capacity of young people, their idea and to highlight their creativity. The importance of youth role and participation projects in all fields. More than 90% of youths who wrote their idea wrote the word "opportunity" or a word carried the same meaning."

The Conference took several sections which carried out by youth promoters like theatrical-sketch "we are not margins", displayed some artwork for talented youth promoter in addition to the lyric artwork representative under the name of "we want a homeland" and a short film about the most important achievements of the project and the campaign continues and supports youth and the hashtag on social media "#Participate_Decide_Change" for those who wish to talk about his/her opinion or idea.