The Institute of Distance and Continuing Education (IDCE), University of Guyana in collaboration with the European Union recently concluded a three-day workshop at Moruca Region One held under the theme ‘Embracing Each Other as We Develop Together Leadership in Partnership’, to equip Amerindian village councils to better manage projects.
The training which encompassed three full days of intense and open discussion and activities, commenced on Wednesday last and concluded on Friday. The training was made possible through EUROPAID under a project termed Non-State Actors and Local Authorities in Development – Building Capacity in Amerindian Communities.
Five resource persons from the IDCE delivered the training. These persons were Director of IDCE Francis Glasgow, Head of the Department of Architecture William Harris, IDCE Lecturer Troy Kellman, Project Coordinator Hansen Elliot and Enid Thom. The workshop in Moruca is to be followed by a similar one in Region Nine.
Day one of the training dealt with leadership and marketing, day two project management and meeting management and day three dealt with financial management, conflict management and gender issues. All of the presentations had parallel activities to ensure that what was taught was understood.
“We have been receiving information [about the community training needs] from time to time. Therefore, when the European Union had the call for proposals, we submitted a proposal which addressed capacity building in Amerindian communities. This actually looks at Region One and Region Nine. In Region One we are looking at the Moruca Sub-Region and in Region Nine it is the south central areas,” Elliot said.
“We looked at the issue of strengthening the leadership capacity in Amerindian councils, in organizations basically addressing projects and we also had a strong emphasis on involving people with disabilities on the project,” he said.
Elliot said too that the project has a component where it will be funding the retrofitting of public places that persons with disabilities would have to access, such as putting in ramps to accommodate persons in wheelchairs.
“The training also looks at improving the qualifications for residents to meet the entry level for tertiary institutions. So we are also looking at the academic subjects,” he said.
He said however that they project has also done in the Moruca Sub-Region subject matters in other areas, such as motor mechanics. “When we came first we saw the need for empowering a set of young people for immediate employment. So that course was carried and about 15 persons benefited. We have also had the opportunity to do some CXC upgrading and we have courses where acting teachers were upgraded for admission to the Cyril Potter College of Education,” Elliot said.
The content of this leadership course focuses on the leadership at the community level, how the community organizations improve their community through the community leadership action. “We also sought to address issues of how they manage their meetings, how we address gender issues in the communities, and also we dealt with two big issues: financial management and project management. Village Councils have been saying that they lack the capacity to really adequately address project management issues,” Elliot said.
He said that at the end of the training they facilitators will leave enough material with the participants so that they can have further training among themselves when they go back to their communities.
He said the trainers would be returning in a year’s time to see what actions would have been taken through the enhanced knowledge that the training provided.
The training is deemed timely and relevant since monies from the Guyana REDD Investment Fund are to be used to fund projects in many of Guyana’s Amerindian communities. Further, there is a Presidential Grant that the villages get which they have to manage themselves.
