The Young Women’s Christian Association’s [YWCA] Justice Program has gone great lengths to mobilize youths in rural areas.
Since the program’s inception in 2020, the program has reached out from the urban setting to the villages across 3 provinces.
The program, which focusses on mobilizing youths to be Peace advocates, engages them in capacity building workshops to identify and resolve potential conflicts and working with Local Court Officials in rural areas to help them become positive decision makers.
Most of the time working with unemployed youths, Senior Project Officer, Jermalyn Okie said that most youths often felt overlooked or looked down upon by their communities.
“Most of the time youths are overlooked in their communities and sometimes look down upon themselves. We’ve seen a huge change since engaging with the youths,” Ms. Okie said.
So far 120 youths and 270 village court officials have gone through capacity building training.
The YWCA and its partners currently engage with youths and Court officials from the National Capital District (NCD), Central Province and Morobe Province (focusing mainly on the Lae urban areas).
In NCD, 3 communities that are being engaged are the Joyce Bay Community, ATS and Hohola while in the Central provincial area, the program engages with the Kemabolo, Alewai, Hisiu, Gavone, Bukuku and Sogeri Villages.
Youths are trained as peer educators and after being trained they become part of the program as volunteers.
The program also provides pathways for youths, should they pursue a career in Law or would like to become Village court officials, provisions will be made to assist them.