Building Capacities for Change

Building Capacities for Change

PRESS RELEASES:
05 May 2010

[Nadi- May 05] Tolerance, respect and open channels of communication are some of the capacities for peace identified at a peace building workshop, currently underway in Nadi. Capacities for peace building exist at the individual, family, community and institutional levels.

Participants examined the causes of conflict in their communities and identified gaps in capacities for peace. In order to do this, they also identified various actors in peace building and the strengths they had as well as the challenges they faced.

The peace building workshop organized by the United Nation Development Programme (UNDP) Pacific Centre is attended by more than fifty participants from Bougainville, Fiji, Papua New Guinea, Solomon Islands and Tonga, who are representatives from governments, non government organizations, private sector and development partners.

The workshop is interactive, with participants breaking into country groups to examine closely the underlying reasons of conflict in their country or a given community.

Reporting back on the discussions of the Tonga country group, Dr Desmond Amosa said the values that once held the community together were being eroded.

“Honesty, respect and collectiveness hold aspects of peace in a Tongan community. The younger generation has slipped away from these values. The events of 2006 in Tonga could have been stopped if these values had not been lost,” said Dr Amosa.

He emphasised that these values and families which serve as a conduit for values, needed to be re-examined.

“Religious groups have a capacity for peace,” said Arieta Tirikula, a member of the Fiji country group.

She said that this was so because of the community outreach and grassroots level engagement of religious groups.

Tony Kaib, highlighted that legal frameworks also had a capacity for peace. He highlighted the specific case of legal frameworks that controlled the spread of arms in Bougainville.

By the end of the first three days of the workshop, participants had analysed different types of conflicts in their communities; identified the actors; as well as the highlighted the capacities for peace. Discussions also highlighted that having identified the actors and capacities for peace, a strategic approach could be taken to peace building.

ENDS

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