Netherlands Institute for Multiparty Democracy
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Democracy training in Suriname
The Democracy Unit in Suriname, the local partner of NIMD, met with local political representatives, launching the first steps towards its young politicians training programme.
On 16 July 2008 more than 50 political party representatives convened in the Surinamese district of Nickerie for a consultation meeting to discuss the Train-the-Trainers Programme, which will be facilitated by the Democracy Unit (DU), NIMD’s local partner in Suriname. Mr. Jimmy Kasipowidjojo, Chairman of the Board of the DU, stressed that “the training will offer a neutral place for politicians where they can meet and discuss the basic principles of a democracy, without getting stuck into sensitive political debates”.
Theory and practice
The purpose of the programme is to provide young politicians not only with key theoretical insights into the basic principles of democracy, the rule of law in Suriname, political history, and policy development, but also with practical skills such as debating, presenting, and meeting techniques. The training will be open to young politicians from all parties as well as journalists and teachers. The first group of ‘students’ will commit themselves to distributing their acquired knowledge to their own parties by leading subsequent trainings.
During the consultation meeting, participants had the opportunity to give their ideas and input for the content and structure of the training programme. Mr. Henri Ori, a member of the DU’s Soundboard, a committee which consists of nine representatives from different political parties in Suriname, presented the concept plan of the training. In addition, NIMD’s Regional Director Latin America, Álvaro Pinto Scholtbach, gave a short speech on the importance of strengthening human resource development within political parties.
Since 2007, the Democracy Unit of the University of Suriname has implemented several democracy programmes in order to strengthen the capacity of Surinamese political parties and to promote democratic principles.
The Train-the-Trainers Programme will start in November 2008 both in Nickerie and Paramaribo. For more information on the training, please feel free to contact the DU through NIMD (Lizzy Beekman - lizzybeekman@nimd.org).
