SALW COURSE GAINS SUPPORT FROM VULNERABLE GROUPS IN MALI. SALW Course gains support from Vulnerable groups in Mali

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1 KAIPTC Volume 7, Issue 2 May - August, 2014 NEWSLETTER SALW COURSE GAINS SUPPORT FROM VULNERABLE GROUPS IN MALI Mrs Djikine Hatouma Gakou Photo: New Field Foundation former course participant of the Small Arms and Light Weapons (SALW) training course Aorganised under the Sahel Project, a special endeavour of the Kofi Annan International Peacekeeping Training Centre, Accra, has put her acquired knowledge to work by reaching out to vulnerable groups in her country. Mrs Djikine Hatouma Gakou was one of 56 persons who attended the in-country SALW Training Course in Mali. Today she is taking ownership of this training by formulating measures to reach out to vulnerable groups and thereby contributing to the reduction of armed violence in the sub-region from the grassroots level. As a first step, Mrs Gakou, who is the President of the Malian Union of Associations and Committees of Women with Disabilities (UMAFH), sent a report to the umbrella body to share information, especially with regards to the ECOWAS Convention on Small Arms and Light Weapons, their Ammunition and Other Related Materials, with cont. on page 2 Inside this issue SALW Course gains support from Vulnerable groups in Mali Funding Partners Pledge Continued Support to KAIPTC p.1 p.2 Sweden: Supporting Peace and Security in Africa Working to Strengthen collaboration between Security Agencies in the Sahel p.5 p.7

2 Volume 7, Issue 2 May - August, 2014 cont. from page 1 other women living with disabilities. Right after the workshop, I submitted my report to the Executive Office of the UMAFH, which comprises of three associations and nine committees of women with disabilities created under joint associations of persons with disabilities. The presidents of these associations and committees then communicated with their various associations, she said. Mrs Afua Lamptey, the Course Director of the KAIPTC SALW Sahel Project, expressed delight with Mrs Gakou's activities adding that incorporating vulnerable groups into advocacy for the reduction of armed violence was a welcome development. She was the first handicapped participant in the SALW course. We have never had any disabled persons or vulnerable groups represented in any of our in-country courses before so it was the first and a woman too, Mrs Lamptey said. Mrs Gakou said the training offered her an opportunity to understand KAIPTC's SALW programme and helped her to understand the enormity of the damage that small arms and light weapons can cause the whole of humanity. I acquired a better understanding of armed violence thus daily violence being committed with the use of weapons; robbery, kidnapping, domestic violence, and rape, which has become a weapon of war, she said. The Sahel Project's SALW course seeks to develop the technical capacity of security sector personnel in Niger, Mali, Burkina Faso, Senegal and Nigeria for an effective arms control regime for the promotion of peace and security in the Sahel. In Mali, the participants, drawn from civil society groups, the police, military, and gendarmerie, were exposed to several core modules. We normally start the course with an introductory framework situating the course in the nature of the African state and, in this instance, the Sahel region. We gave them an overview of armed violence and small arms control and legal frameworks for small arms control, Mrs Lamptey said adding that the highlight of the training was a visit to a local small arms manufacturing workshop. Mrs Gakou asked that these trainings be passed on to smaller communities, adding that people with disabilities could play significant roles in this community-level advocacy. As a woman with a disability, any policy or means that can help reduce the number of people with disabilities would be useful for achieving my goals which is to reduce the number of people with disabilities. This is my everyday battle; advocacy and lobbying in this regard should be strengthened in all areas, she said. The KAIPTC Small Arms and Light Weapons programme is supported by the Japanese Government, UNDP and the ECOWAS Commission. Funding Partners Pledge Continued Support Funding partners of the Kofi Annan International Peacekeeping Training Centre (KAIPTC) gathered with key members of staff of the Centre to go over existing relationships and to strategise for future collaboration. At least 16 of the Centre's foreign and local partners were represented at the second edition of the Partners Forum, the first meeting having taken place in Development partners, made up of individual states, and institutions, provide funding and technical support to the running of the Centre. Welcoming the participants to Accra, Air Commodore Julius Dzamefe, the Deputy Commandant of the Centre, gave an overview of the purpose for the meeting. Last year, the KAIPTC instituted this forum and held a maiden meeting. This forum is aimed at providing a platform for the Centre and partners to discuss and debate, at a technical level, issues of mutual interests. During the maiden meeting we sought your input into the mechanisms for setting up this forum as well as our new Strategic Plan We took your input and, thankfully, the strategic plan was approved by the governing board last December and currently we are at the point of implementing the strategic plan, he said. cont. on page 3 2

3 Volume 7, Issue 2 May - August, 2014 cont. from page 2 Key activities during the meeting included presentations on the Centre's New Strategic Plan The Director of the Policy, Planning, Monitoring and Evaluation Department, Mrs Levinia Addae-Mensah, gave an overview of some of the steps carried out by the Centre in line with the new Strategic Plan which aims to strengthen the institutional and financial sustainability of the Centre. She spoke on some achievements of the Centre's Faculty of Academic Affairs Research (FAAR) which include the start of two new programmes, the Executive Masters and PhD Programmes, scheduled to start in July and September, 2014 respectively. She also spoke of the introduction of new training courses. In terms of our focus on the core mandate of the Centre, within six months into our 5-year strategic plan, we have not only reviewed the existing courses but have also introduced new courses and, through our research, are still working on identifying new courses. We have also started the process for developing and doing the consultations for the long distance programme which will be rolled out from next year, she said. The Director of FAAR, Dr Kwesi Aning, also spoke about the unique features of the Centre's activities urging the partners to demand that the Centre remains accountable. We promise to contribute to creating a stable West We promise to contribute to creating a stable West African environment. The courses we run are unique. Everything comes together, the research that is done feeds into the training. African environment. The courses we run are unique. Everything comes together, the research that is done feeds into the training. So what we are developing is a centre that is holistic in its approach. Now, that is very unique and I think that there are very few training centres in the world that do this, he said. Core partners of the Centre, countries made up of the trio of Denmark, Norway, and Sweden who provide direct funds for the running of the Centre, offered several observations and urged the Centre to maintain the standards of existing courses and improve in other areas. I am very impressed with what I see whenever I come to the Centre. I also hear from colleagues, Swedish officers and others involved in the peace and security agenda of Africa that they always have very high regards of what the Centre is delivering in terms of interesting courses, etc. That does not mean everything is perfect, of course there is room for improvement, Ms Lena Schildt, Deputy Head of Regional Co-operation, Peace and Security of the Embassy of Sweden, said. The Swiss Ambassador to Ghana, HE Gerhard Brugger pledged the continued support of his country to the Centre. Other partners who made observations during the meeting include Denmark, represented by Ms Birthe Larsen of the Royal Danish Embassy, Addis Ababa; Germany, represented by Ms Isolde Rausch of the Embassy and Ms Nana Odoi of the German Agency for cont. on page 8 At least 16 of the Centre s foreign and local partners were represented at the second edition of the forum to discuss and debate issues of mutual interests at a technical level 3

4 Volume 7, Issue 2 May - August, 2014 Third batch of graduates of the Master of Arts in Conflict, Peace and Security (MCPS). The KAIPTC has churned out 172 graduates from 16 countries 3 years after the launch of the post graduate programmes. Hon Dr. Benjamin Kunbuor (MP), Minister for Defence and chair of the KAIPTC's Governing Board and his deputy Mr. Alex Segbefia paid an official maiden visit to the Centre. Dr. Kunbour, a former Attorney General and Minister for Justice, is an expert on security sector governance, constitutional law and Human Rights Development and will bring his expertise to bear in the work of the KAIPTC. Supt. Fanny Aboagye, KAIPTC Police Course Director (middle) chaired the police component at the 20th IAPTC conference held in Indonesia. She chaired the police functional group discussions and was involved in the overall planning of the conference. 4

5 Volume 7, Issue2 May - August, 2014 SWEDEN, DENMARK, NORWAY: Supporting Peace and Security in Africa Lena Schildt shares her views in an interview Birthe Larsen (Danish Embassy, Addis Ababa) and Lena Schildt As a core funding partner of the Kofi Annan International Peacekeeping Training Centre (KAIPTC), Sweden, alongside Denmark and Norway, has recently renewed its funding commitments through the Joint Financing Arrangement which pools resources into a single purse for the daily running of the Centre. Sweden, through the Swedish International Development Cooperation Agency (SIDA), has pledged over USD4 million to be disbursed over a four-year period. Lena Schildt, Deputy Head, Regional Co-operation, Peace and Security at the Embassy of Sweden in Addis Ababa is charged with overseeing the existing collaboration between Sweden and the KAIPTC. In this interview, Ms Schildt gives her views on the motivation for Sweden's regional development endeavours in Africa and the Centre. She speaks of the challenges of maintaining foreign aid amidst emerging security threats on the continent despite concerted efforts to engender peace and security. Q: Why is Sweden interested in Peace and Security in Africa? A: We have a regional cooperation strategy which states that we are going to fund a number of sectors; Peace and Security is one of those sectors. So that's the reason number one. You could say Peace and Security is a very important sector in the regional strategy. It has always been important from the beginning already when the strategy was adopted in 2010 and I must say that now, down the lane in 2014, Peace and Security is still holding its place as one of the most important sectors that Sweden is funding. We have a portfolio in Peace and Security in the strategy which amounts to about SEK140 million [USD 20 million] per year and around 20 different initiatives and contributions ranging from support to the AU Peace and Security Department to ECOWAS and to various NGOs and Think Tanks. It has come, a bit naturally, that the KAIPTC is part of that overall support. Q: What sort of collaboration exists between Sweden and KAIPTC? A: What we have here is a Joint Financing Arrangement together with Norway and Denmark. Why do we have such an arrangement? Sweden has the same policies and views with Denmark and other like-minded countries. The JFA is in line with what was agreed upon among the donor partners in Paris which is often referred to as the Paris Agenda. The Paris Agenda clearly states that a joint financing or budget support is much more efficient for the cont. on page 6 5

6 Volume 7, Issue 2 May - August, 2014 cont. from page 5 receiving partner because the partner only has to deal with one instead of dealing with various partners. There's one report, one account to which the partners disperse the funds, etc. So when the whole discussion and the policies were established, Sweden was one of the main advocates for that type of mechanism. Down the lane, the adherence to the agenda has sort of become weakened. Sweden is still adhering to the agenda because we still believe in it but if it is only Sweden and Denmark left at the end, it will be very difficult to uphold the agenda. Q: Do all the participating countries contribute the same sum? A: No, the beauty, if I may call it that, of the Joint Financing is that you don't have to. But the whole idea is that the receiver of the support shall have a rather robust strategy and programme running over some time, say, five or six years or so. If we believe in the programme, we can start discussions on how much we can contribute. Q: How long has this partnership with KAIPTC been what is the arrangement? A: It all started in Actually when UK withdrew its funding we came, chipping in what had been withdrawn together with Denmark and Norway. That is how we came on board. In 2013, the Joint Financing Arrangement (JFA) was reaffirmed and it runs up to There is also a Bilateral Agreement between the two partners which regularizes the disbursement of the money. It stipulates that if there is any specific regulation, outside the JFA, between Sweden and the Centre with regard to the Swedish funding and we entered into such a new a bilateral agreement last year for four years, supporting the Centre with SEK 7 million [USD 1 million] per year from Q: Does your government have any way of checking the outcome of the funds being put in especially with regards contributing to Peace and Security in the sub-region? What have your impressions been with this collaboration? A: Yes, that is the Swedish Embassy in Addis Ababa and myself so to speak, I do the checking on behalf of my bosses and the Swedish government. Since we give core support that is fairly easy in terms of where the support has gone. We can just look at KAIPTC expenditure sheet and read your annual report since our funding goes into the administrative and operation of the Centre. And then if you sort of add on to that and question what results that has led to, that is the big question that we are constantly asking the Centre. We know that we have contributed the money and it goes to salaries or procurement of stationery, etc. and that helps the Centre to be able to perform. But to respond to the question about the impact or effect of what the Centre is doing, I would say we don't have the full picture. That is a constant part of the dialogue between the partners. Of course, it is not always easy to evaluate or assess the impact of the Centre's operations especially since this is also a long term issue. One could say, however, that ten years is good enough to look back and assess one's achievement. And that is where KAIPTC is today. If we really look into the Swedish government's own ambitions for contributing to and supporting Peace and Security on the continent, it is of course extremely difficult to assess the results of those ambitions. If you look at the overall picture of Peace and Security on the continent right now, the picture is rather gloomy if we compare it to four, five years ago. We could actually say, of course, in some places the situation has improved a bit but then you have other hot spots that have come up, for example Nigeria, the Sahel area, South Sudan, etc. So if we want to play the devil's advocate, such as some might do, they could ask why the Swedish government is putting money into an African Institution that is there to promote peace and yet these violent conflicts are still going on. Q: Other Funding partners of KAIPTC support the Centre with restricted funding or earmarked funding for specific projects or programmes. Do you see any possibility of changes, of Sweden moving away from core funding or backtracking from supporting the Centre due to the so-called donor fatigue? A: Yes and no. Yes, donor fatigue is nothing new. We have talked about donor fatigue for the last years but apparently the donor fatigue does not ever come totally and that is something that our partners know. We talk a lot about it but usually, we do not withdraw, especially not in peace and security because of the very high risks that means cont. on page 7 6

7 Volume 7, Issue 2 May - August, 2014 cont. from page 6 for the continent and not only for the continent. Therefore, I would like to say that for Sweden it will take long before Sweden would withdraw from supporting the peace and security sector on the African continent. Of course there are always limits and limits are sometimes looked at from the outside. We have to remember that Sweden and other European countries have suffered quite heavily financially since the crisis in Sweden, and some countries in Europe have recuperated slowly by slowly, but some countries are still struggling and the consequences of the financial crisis are still very well-known by the citizens and therefore tax payers are also very keen on where their governments are spending the money. Q: Does Sweden have any particular interest in supporting some of these institutions in Africa? A: We have a regional cooperation strategy which very well reflects the policy of the Swedish government. That strategy is, of course, tied to an overall policy which governs Sweden's development cooperation. You might know that Sweden is one of the few countries that actually adhere to the UN policy that we should give 1% of our GDP in development cooperation aid. So that is the government's very firm principle and that principle will not change even if there is a government change in the coming elections. This is a very strong principle that has been in full force ever since we started contributing to development cooperation in the 1960 s. Q: Is Sweden happy with the work KAIPTC is doing? A: I am very impressed with what I see whenever I come to the Centre. That does not mean that everything is running perfectly, it seldom does that. Then of course in discussions, such as during the Partners Forum which are more technical in nature, there are lots of things that come up and we might have a lot of issues and questions to bring up. That is completely normal. But on the whole, I am really impressed. I also hear from others, from colleagues and other Swedish officers, people who are involved in the Peace and Security agenda in Africa, they always have a very high esteem of what the Centre is delivering in terms of relevant courses etc. Working to Strengthen Collaboration between Security Agencies in the Sahel Five countries identified as the Sahel countries of the ECOWAS sub-region were the target of a project created by the Kofi Annan International Peacekeeping Training Centre (KAIPTC) to primarily conduct in-country training in Integrated Security Sector Management (SSM) in relation to transnational criminal activities. The project, Promoting Dialogue and Strengthening Operational Level Competence in the Security Sector in the Sahel (the Sahel Project), funded by Japan, began in March, 2013 and was wrapped up in July The Centre has trained over 720 persons across the five states: Mali, Niger, Burkina Faso, Senegal and Nigeria during this period. The Director of the Sahel Project, Mr John Pokoo, says the idea of the project is to bring key security sector practitioners, including policy-makers and nationallevel technocrats, from various related agencies to undergo a common training. In these five countries, what we have done is to conduct trainings and policy advocacy meetings. The idea is to bring policy makers to a common understanding of key issues. We focused on middle-level professionals in the security agencies and civil society groups, he said adding that some of the participants came from such agencies as: the Police, Military, Gendarmerie, Customs, Game and Wildlife, Prisons, Immigrations, and Intelligence agencies. Several Members of Parliament also had opportunities to participate in some of the sessions. Mr Pokoo, who heads KAIPTC's Small Arms and Light Weapons (SALW) programme, said the meetings were an opportunity for members of the various agencies to exchange ideas and foster collaboration. It is so exciting. We are talking about people who have worked for over 25 years, in some cases, and yet do not cont. on page 8 7

8 NEWSLETTER Volume 7, Issue 2 May - August, 2014 cont. from page 7 know their counterparts on the other side even though they work in the same country. These are senior officers, potentially taking up political positions in their countries, but have never trained together with colleagues in agencies working towards similar goals. The advantage of this programme is a common understanding of other organisations. We hope that through this training, the culture of suspicion among security agencies would be broken down and we will see more collaboration between them, he said. Mr Pokoo has also added that some expected outcomes from the project include co-ordinated cross-border cooperation and the harmonization of security-related laws across the Sahel region. At the moment, we are conducting the evaluation of the project and finishing up on the research phase of the project which focuses on the trans-national crime dynamics in the Sahel. We are also conducting research on crimes in Mali and the implications this has on security and stability in the Sahel. We will conclude these two major research projects and then develop policy papers. This will bring the Sahel Project to conclusion, he said. The trainings, administered according to perceived need across the states, composed of five main courses: Border Security Management, Small Arms and Light Weapons Trafficking in the Sahel, Piracy and Transnational Crime, Collaborative Policing, and Security Sector Governance. A total number of 88 subject matter experts, including three Japanese and 28 French-speaking experts served as resource persons for the project. cont. from page 3 Funding Partners Pledge Continued Support International Corporation (GIZ). Germany has supported the KAIPTC since it was set up in 2003 and is currently in talks with the Centre for continued support in the coming years. Air Commodore Dzamefe acknowledged the support of the partners in his closing remarks. We thank all the partners for taking time out of their schedule to attend this meeting. It is very clear that without your support this Centre would not have come this far. On behalf of the Centre, we thank you, he said. WHAT PARTICIPANTS SAY ABOUT OUR COURSES Criminal Justice Executive Training Course "For a long time, I thought of criminal justice in terms of the rights of persons caught in conflict with the law. That was the general direction that I thought this course was going to take. Upon embarking on this course, however, I find that the course content is a lot more. I have a broader sense of what is expected in the leadership role that I hold as a judge. The result is that I will think even more thoroughly of the nuances of the decisions that have to be made." Justice Afia Serwah Asare-Botwe (Mrs.) Justice of the High Court, Ghana. For further information contact: The Head of Corporate Affairs (KAIPTC) PMB CT 210, Cantonments Accra,Ghana Tel: ext 1104 Fax: ebenezer.anum-tetteh@kaiptc.org