Problem Solving for 200 Traditional Leaders

Since January 2015 Ba Futuru's Consolidating Peace and Democracy Initiative has undertaken twenty-two (22) 5-day trainings on conflict resolution, gender-based violence and civic education for 584 (342 Male and 242 Female) traditional leaders, youth, NGO workers and police empowering them with enhanced knowledge and skills. 

In addition 20 follow up evaluations were completed 1-3 months after the initial training with 330 participants.

In the follow up surveys inidicated:

-       100% of the participants reported that they had used the conflict mitigation knowledge or skills from the training in their daily lives

-       89% of the participants also reported that they had helped in resolving conflicts in their friends, family and community since they attended the training.

-       100% of the participants expressed that after they attended the training they have had positive changes in their behavior.

One positive additional effect of the project was that participants would influence the mind-set and behavior of other people and contribute to the conflict transformation and prevention within communities. They did not only acquire an increased knowledge of conflict resolution, gender-based violence and civic education after the trainings, but they would also pass on information about these topics to their friends, family and community.

For example, in a follow up evaluation, a 55-year-old male DNPCC Focal Point in Bobonaro stated: “I am very happy with the training that I participated in three months ago because I learned new lessons that were relevant to my work as a focal point. I have shared the information, especially about conflict transformation, with youth so that they can change their bad behavior such as fighting and provoking each other. In addition, I have applied the lessons in our society, and I have facilitated and analyzed youth violent conflict.  We found the root cause of the problem and finally, we got a good solution and the youth accepted it.They also promised not to fight again in the future.”

Ba Futuru distributes booklets on conflict resolution and civic education as well as training manuals to the participants so that they can readily share the information and knowledge they learned in the training with other people.

As part of this project we had an art compeition on women peace and security in late 2016. Then we used the images to create billboards and banners that are being installed across Timor-Leste. Moreover in preparation for the 2017 national elections we have designed billboards promoting non violent youth participation in the elections.