10-6-2020
Within the Marginalised Local Communities Development Project in partnership with seven municipalities in the central and southern Gaza Strip (Al-Bureij, Al-Qarara, New Abasan, Khuza'a, Al-Shoka, Al-Nasr and Rafah), implemented through the Municipal Development and Lending Fund (MDLF) with funding from the Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation (SDC) and the German development agency GIZ.
On Wednesday and Thursday 10 and 11 March 2020, the Palestinian Center for Democracy and Conflict Resolution held two simulation sessions of an awareness workshop on citizenship and community participation, targeting 45 facilitators who are the social accountability and participation ambassadors. They in turn will pass on this knowledge to some 7,000 people from the marginalised local communities through 250 sessions, with a focus on marginalised groups including women, persons with disabilities and older people. The sessions will cover the concept of community participation and social accountability, the benefits of community participation and social accountability, the main challenges and obstacles facing citizens, and the proposed mechanisms for improving community participation.
They were trained by Mr. Abdel Moneim Al-Tahrawi on the best methods and techniques for conveying simplified information to citizens in a way that helps create awareness and knowledge that motivates them to take part in neighbourhood committees, to engage with their local councils and in the sessions and workshops held by the municipality, to submit complaints and to take part at other levels of community participation.
It is worth noting that the community participation and accountability ambassadors were selected according to specific criteria, the most important of which was having attended the community participation and social accountability training that covered 285 participants from the marginalised local communities in the seven municipalities, starting in April 2019. They were then invited to sit an assessment test shared through the Centre's page; some 76 participants took the test, and the final list of 50 participants was selected as the list of those taking part in the advanced participation and accountability skills and training facilitation course.
