Lawrence Nwimo, Awka
A total of 30 youths in Anambra State have been trained on policy advocacy and are now ready to actively engage in advocating for important issues affecting their communities.
The workshop was organised by Catch Them Young Community Initiative (CATYCOI) with support from Nigeria Youth Future Fund and LEAP Africa. The training was held in Amawbia, Awka South Local Government Area of the state, Friday.
Addressing the participants, Executive Director of CATYCOI, Mr Nonso Orakwe, explained that the training was to equip youths with the necessary skills and knowledge to effectively promote their causes and influence decision-makers in the society.
“We are talking about policy advocacy. We want to prepare young people to be proactive and at the helm of policy making.
“The training is to make them understand how laws are made and the reasons everybody should put heads together in advocating for policies that would engender good governance to move the country forward,” Orakwe said in his brief remark.
Ikengaonline reports that participants at the two-day workshop were drilled generally on the overview of advocacy, mapping of stakeholders, processes of lawmaking, and how to draft policies, among others.
One of the facilitators and staff of the Anambra State House of Assembly, Antonia Obi, during her lecture on Legislative Processes, introduced the participants to the stages and principles of drafting legislation and policy documents.
“With this, when they see a legislation, they should be able to know if it was properly drafted or not. Also, they should be able to know the stages of lawmaking both at the national and state levels,” she told the reporter.
Arinze Egoh, another staff of the State House of Assembly who took them through government budgeting and budget processes, encouraged them to leverage the opportunity to hold their leaders and representatives accountable.
Egoh encouraged them to always scrutinise government spendings. He urged them to criticise the government objectively and remain focused to attain their life goals.
Earlier, CATYCOI Program Manager, Israel Orji, tasked the participants to leverage the opportunity of contributing to nation building and career growth.
According to him, “the agenda is to have active young people that can follow-up policies because most young people do not know the processes. We want young people to be active and follow laws and issues around lawmaking.
“After the training, they are going to start active advocacies to see laws that are already in process. If there are new laws to be drafted, they can do that and follow-up issues.
“They can now actively go to their representatives and tell them these are the issues we want you to solve and actually advocate for policies. If there are policies that are already in place or laws that are not actively working, they can then follow up individually or as cohorts.
“After training them. We shall group them into cohorts, meaning that when they embark on the advocacies, would be as a group and not individual.”
He said the group will work together to identify key issues that need to be addressed, develop strategies for advocacy campaigns, and mobilise support from the community to address them.
Some of the participants during interviews said they are committed to making positive impacts and creating positive changes in their communities through policy advocacy.
Mercy Anakor, a graduate of microbiology, said she was privileged to have participated in the training, noting that she had nursed interest in issues concerning youths and governance.
Elizabeth Ijele, a participant with disability, said she learnt about policy and advocacy, the processes of policy making and the steps in advocacy.
“This training has empowered me and given me the knowledge that I need to identify issues in my community and be able to advocate for them to be addressed,” she added.
For Miracle Uzochukwu, the workshop has woken him up from slumber.
“This is the kind of training that I need now considering the condition of Nigeria and the condition of the youths. It actually passed a message to me and I will cascade them to other youths of my community,” he said.
