2024 Legislative and Regional Elections: HCRRUN strengthens the capacity of local peace committees for peaceful polls
Members of the Local Peace Committees (CLP) from the Savanes, Kara, and Centrale regions participated from February 19 to 27, 2024, in capacity-building sessions on report writing, conflict prevention and resolution, and support for the High Commissioner for Reconciliation and Strengthening National Unity (HCRRUN) for peaceful elections.
Initiated by HCRRUN, these series of regional workshops aim to strengthen the capacities of CLP members to enable them to successfully carry out their assigned mission. The sessions equipped the CLPs with administrative writing techniques, particularly the drafting of reports and minutes, and helped them understand and apply techniques for peaceful conflict prevention and resolution. Through these workshops, the CLPs also learned how to raise awareness among the populations in their localities for peaceful elections in the country.
The first rapporteur of HCRRUN, Evalo Wiyao, stated that their institution, as part of its mission, decided to collaborate with the CLPs, which are associative structures established since 2016 as part of the implementation of a sub-regional peace infrastructure. And for better collaboration, he said, it was necessary to provide a certain number of tools to these committees working in the field of peace so that they could better support HCRRUN. Mr. Wiyao noted that in addition to themes on peacekeeping, electoral issues were also addressed during these meetings. “Since we are approaching the elections, we felt it was important to discuss issues with these committees that will allow the Togolese population to go to these elections in a climate of peace,” he added.
The first rapporteur affirms that, with the exception of the period from 2007 to the present, all elections organized in Togo were marred by violence, hence the need to consolidate the gains made by the country since 2007 by learning from best practices that can lead to peaceful elections. Mr. Wiyao concluded by recalling the role of the CLPs, which is essentially to sensitize political party activists on the freedom that must be granted to all political parties to conduct their activities freely and normally during election periods.
Following Dapaong, Kara, and Sokodé, these regional capacity-building workshops for CLPs will continue in the other regions of the country.