By Mabinty M. Kamara
In an effort to boost their advocacy skills, Oxfam and implementing partners, the Network Movement for Justice and Development have trained over 40 natural resource rights and economic justice advocates on a new advocacy phenomenon known as Influencing.
The training which was held in Freetown on the 31st of May 2021 brought together advocacy platform members from seven districts of Kono, Tonkolili, Bonthe, Moyamba, Kenema and Port Loko .
Speaking at the opening ceremony of the training, Emmanuel Gbondo, the Project Lead for the Economic and Social Justice project said the training was to share knowledge and develop new strategies on how they could improve on their daily advocacy activities to get the duty bearers and the people they advocate for understand their points of view and reach a consensus.
He added that the training will be of great help to the Mining Advocacy (MAPs) platform members as it will empower them with the basic knowledge to: “identify their communal problems and work with other likeminded people and organizations to make a difference in society; putting a problem on the agenda, providing a solution to that problem and building support for acting on both the problem and solution; develop strategies focusing on how to influence decision-making at the community and national levels,”.
The Executive Director for NMJD, Abu Augustus Brima said a lot has over the years changed in the mining sector due to the persistence of Civil Society Activists in the country to get the duty bearers to do the right thing in the interest of the communities they advocate for.
He admonished the CSOs present to continue to work in the interest of the people and their communities for whom they were organized. He also cautioned them to be mindful of the fact that they are not policymakers and that they do need the policymakers to achieve their goals.
“And so knowing who we are, we need to make our work very strategic to get the policymakers to trust us so they could listen to our organized point of view,” he said.
In his statement, Oxfam Country Director, John Makina admonished the platform members to engage in evidence-based advocacy by working closely with the communities in which they operate. He noted that in advocacy, there was a need to work with everybody including the people whose voices are more powerful because he said when the communities speak even the duty bearers cannot shut them up.
He said his organization has been working with NMJD to strengthen mining advocacy platforms in mining communities in Sierra Leone. However, he said his organization has been faced with funding constraints exacerbated by the Coronavirus pandemic that has forced them to cease operations in 18 countries globally including Sierra Leone, by March 2022.
He however encouraged NMJD and the platform members to continue the good work which he said might attract other donor partners in the event they are gone.
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