Africa and Middle East

atiti's picture

JOIN NOW! 8th Global RCE Conference Africa Discussion Group

Welcome to the 2013 Global RCE Conference Africa Discussion Group! Please join in the pre-conference discussions today by sharing your thoughts on the topics you feel most need to be addressed in the group meeting during the Global Conference in Nairobi.

Also share your RCE highlights in 2013 and suggest ways of consolidating collaborative efforts in ESD research and capacity development. Suggest strategies on mobilizing adequate resources to implement collaborative flagship ESD projects in African RCEs and deliberate ways to actively engage policy makers in RCE activities.

Africa

Comments

RCEbuea's picture

During the just ended 3rd African RCE Regional conference, at least two people raised concern on the fact that illiteracy is usually associated to not being able to read, write or communicate in any foreign international language like English and French. I think indigenous knowledge and cultural heritage comes in handy here. I think local communities should be made to understand that they have a lot to contribute towards Global Development. Looking forward to a model plan for propagating such knowledge from various communities far and wide.
Abdullahi Tijjani's picture

It is important to note that in kano though English is the official language the mass lite racy campaign is extended to hhe ability to read and writes in Either English ,Hausa or Arabic apart from English. Kano state has been taken the lead I mass literacy all over the wesstbAfricav.Therefore in as much as that people can be able to read write in the native or local or religious language are consider as literate
Abdullahi Tijjani's picture

It is important to note that in kano though English is the official language the mass lite racy campaign is extended to hhe ability to read and writes in Either English ,Hausa or Arabic apart from English. Kano state has been taken the lead I mass literacy all over the wesstbAfricav.Therefore in as much as that people can be able to read write in the native or local or religious language are consider as literate
RCEbuea's picture

During the just ended 3rd African RCE Regional conference, at least two people raised concern on the fact that illiteracy is usually associated to not being able to read, write or communicate in any foreign international language like English and French. I think indigenous knowledge and cultural heritage comes in handy here. I think local communities should be made to understand that they have a lot to contribute towards Global Development. Looking forward to a model plan for propagating such knowledge from various communities far and wide.
Evans Kipngeno's picture

Dear Mr Masango,

Glad to read about illiteracy in local and rural folks.
Going by the definition you have stated, i think the communication media in the rural setup is influenced by the presence of a certain ethnic group that talk in a certain language in that region. For example given a community of Nigeria, the Ibo or Yoruba community, they will always talk that language in that rural setup. Buying an item from shop, butchery, traveling from one center to another within same community will always have that one language as the only form of communication. May be we should now ask ourselves, what can be done to encourage that closed system of communication in those given community set-ups? Should they be thought french, English? and perhaps why would they want to learn that language in that community.
Also, one studies another language to be able to communicate to someone of that language somewhere. If the dominant group prevailing in that region, is not of any foreign language, the community will not find any need to learn that second language.
RCEbuea's picture

Dear Mr. Kipngeno, I am sorry for my long absence here. I very much agree with you here and also want to point out that the issue of concern was that, those who can communicate only in local languages such as Ibo and Haousa are most often not considered as literates because they do not speak an international language.This contributes to faulty and inaccurate statistics in some cases. I am not saying that this is a major problem but it is important to us mostly as Africans. I think working on promoting our local languages along side our culture is a step towards the right direction.
RCEtichpesanayi's picture

Dear Maarifa, Evans, Bukar and Misango

Thank you very much for your postings, which are very useful. Regarding the next conference in Nairobi what do you think we need to plan for to make it a success, and to make the African RCEs meeting a success?

Perhaps it would be useful to have our Africa RCEs updated report in place and share information around these questions:

• Highlights for 2013
• What were your successes?
• Which issues are you working on and how are they contributing to your local community development and Africa's development at large?
• Which other RCEs did you collaborate with and how?
• What challenges did you encounter and how did you deal with them?
• What are your plans for 2014?

Please feel free to email your feedback to tich@wessa.co.za so that I can consolidate the feedback. If you have any photos it would be great.

Thanks
Tichaona
(On behalf of Dick Kachilonda)
atiti's picture

Tich, this is excellent.
RCEbuea's picture

Dear Tich, I think yours is a good strategy. I will put together something brief from us, Masango.
RCEkano's picture

Tichaona sir, That is a beautiful one. We may if i can suggest,that we should also while discussing all that deal with the four fundamentals: I-Research and Development, ii-Governance and coordination,iii- Collaboration and partnership, communications and outreach within and with outside community or other RCEs or organization. I will also suggest further that we can peep through our annual reports and evaluation and make available to Tich all that he is looking for. It will be much easier for us all. Ali Bukar
RCEkano's picture

I will like to suggest that RCEs in Africa should start thinking of how to tackle conflicts as an impediment to sustainable development in Africa.
Evans Kipngeno's picture

Mr Bukar,

Conflicts are spontaneous in nature, and happen when you least expect them to, in your opinion and maybe just to brainstorm, and prepare for this kind of discussion, what would you suggest are recipes for chaos and conflicts in Africa, and what mechanisms can be put in place to stop them? Good day. Kipngeno.
RCEkano's picture

Mr Evan sir, Sorry for the long delay from me. I was in recess but now i am back fully.As you rightly pointed out conflicts are spontaneous in nature but at the same time are diverse both in origin,scale and mechanism. The type of conflicts in Europe, for example are different with those in Africa. Those in the developed countries are different from those in the developing countries to some extent. So what informed African conflicts?
I will attempt to point out some in my opinion.
1- Natural resources and greed.
2-Religions and Misinterpretations
3-Corruption and Poverty
4-Democracy/Demo-crazy and Political Dictatorship
5-External interference
6-Ethnicity and Ethnic nepotism
RCEgreaterpwani's picture

To strength the African RCE we probably need to think of collaborative activities that touches on wider thematic issues such as the so many conflicts in Africa, encroachment of desertification especially in the sub Sahara Africa, climate change etc. Shared challenges can easily bring us together as one.
atiti's picture

Dear Misango and Bukar,
Thank you for your posts.
atiti's picture

Dear Colleagues your comments are required on how we can strengthen African RCEs
RCEgreaterpwani's picture

Dear Colleagues. Collaborative activities (Researches and projects) that touch on wider thematic areas such as conflicts, climate change issues etc will bring us together as one
RCEmakanaruraleasterncape's picture

This seems to be a big group with many interesting posts. At this stage on the road to Nairobi it would be useful for those, like me, who would like to join the site, to be able to pick up on some of the key lines of conversation that need to be taken into RCE deliberation in Nairobi. After this initial opening-stage, will there be discussion documents or position papers available and how does one get to these?
atiti's picture

I am at the moment trying to pick up lines of conversation that need to be taken into RCE deliberation. I will generate a generic description for use in Conference Booklet by RCE Greater Nairobi. Keep the discussion going.
RCEbuea's picture

Dear Colleagues I also want to second the ideas presented by Mr. Maarifa and Dr. Bukar. I have also observed that the quest for stronger collaborative ties is very much solicited. What do you think about a Twinning scheme?
RCEdickkachilonda's picture

Dear Colleagues, sorry for coming late to the discussion forum. Thank you all guys for your contributions and I am sure this year's African continental meeting will be exceptional. One thing I want to open up for discussion is the issues of policy makers involvement in our RCEs., We saw last year in South Korea, the organisers had arranged for a meeting with policy makers and out of that meeting a lot of important ideas came out. We have also seen and learnt from out colleagues in Nigeria where policy makers fully supported the RCE continental meeting. It is also pleasing to hear that some policy makers will be present in Kenya. How can we motivate policy makers from other countries to follow these good examples. I personally feel we need the support from our policy makers and with that African RCEs will be very unique.
RCEdickkachilonda's picture

The other one is the active involvement of the youths. We have seen from our colleagues in Kenya that youths are getting more involved. We also had good experiences in the Netherland where the youth are very active participants of the RCE. We also need to see how we can promote that. I know Ali and Tich will have good ideas about these because they have been engaging with youths. Let us also thing more about it.
Evans Kipngeno's picture

Colleagues, thanks for the interesting posts on upcoming conference. I am also sorry for being out of touch fro a week or two due to unavoidable engagement. However, i see we are on the way there now and we haven't missed the target. We are on course.

A few months ago, i uploaded a case study in Africa and rest of the world on rising cases of child abuse and murder. It was meant to be discussed and get views on how child welfare and security could be addressed at the conference. The case study was on topic ' Child Welfare and Security' and this was actually meant to be a new topic for discussion by this group to zero in on items that need to be addressed urgently to save our children.

As you may have read on papers and other news briefs, on live media, there are rising cases of child murder and abuse. The murders occur in insecure family. It would go that a father and mother have a quarrel, and one of them would kill the children. The reason given by experts on this strange phenomena, is that there are three reasons why parent end up killing their children after a slight quarrel. One would be because of self pity and unfulfilled family expectations, two, stress syndrome, and lastly family infidelity by one of the parents. The experts suggest that if there be one or two of above factors in family, it would definitely trigger the scenario. Yesterday here in Kenya, a man killed his two children aged four and six respectively, just because he did not find his wife at home when he came back from work.
He slashed his two children two death and took poison and also died instantly.

My main suggestion in this column was to find out if this may be an item we need to discuss at conference. Personally, i think we should because of the following reasons. Child Welfare and Security is an environmental concern that affects the society in as much as child welfare is concerned. In Kenya, the center of expertise that would usually be responsible for this phenomena is called 'Child Welfare Society' In my own assessed opinion, this is the group that would have much to say about what is happening in our country here. I am sure, in other countries too, there are similar society as this.
I do now know if we should discuss this as to find what the center of expertise for children should do in order to contain this menace in our society?

However, looking into this in broader terms, it would be a concern to everyone of us. Our children are our future
and without them we have no future.

Before i post what i think could be discussed at conference first it would be good to hear from you also what you think about this problem.
RCEbuea's picture

I am really very much in agreement with Mr. Kachilonda's suggestion on looking at ways to get policy makers involved in our activities. I hope we get to share on this.
RCEkakamegawesternkenya's picture

The issue of funding has really affected many good ideas and projects in africa. even when there is funding it is in the hands of wrong people but let us discuss on how to address policy and implementation of our activities.ESD is to help us look beyond our interests for us to succeed and save this beautiful and resourceful continent.
Kholiwe Cindzi's picture

GOOD MORNING MY FELLOWS

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