By Boris
Esono in Buea
 |
| Participant receiving testimonial after workshop |
Some members
of political parties, CSOs and the media across Fako division have been exalted
not relent their efforts in putting in place participatory democracy. This was
during a one day training workshop last December 20, organized by Citizen
Initiative for the Reinforcement of Democracy, INCRED.
The various speakers at the
workshop called on youths and women to register on the voters’ registers and to
vote en masse during upcoming elections. They discouraged the dormant attitude
of youths in electoral processes.
Speaking on the theme
“understanding a political manifesto”, Prof. Claude Abe enjoined the youths to
participate in upcoming elections as they have the power to change the whole
electoral process in Cameroon.
“Youths should kill the “free
rider” in them if they want to succeed in changing the present electoral
system,” Prof. Abe said.
According to him, the present
situation is very baffling as most political parties do not have a manifesto
which makes it difficult for them to operate. “For some political parties, for
example those under the banner of the opposition, what they call political
manifesto is very loose and shabby”. “The objective of the opposition is to see
the head of state stand down but after that, what next. They still do not have
an answer”.
He concluded by encouraging the
various political parties to have a political manifesto and for it to be
visible for the denizens to see and understand. “Political manifesto is the
future of your party. It is an instrument of development where other political
parties can use and implement in their own spheres of influence”.
To Lackban Nseta, Buea Electoral
District, SDF, “what I have learned so far will be implemented in my community.
If you move forward, mobilize, sensitize and educate there will be a lot of
conviction on the part of the citizens to vote come election date”.
A total of eight (8) hundred
observers will be deployed for the various elections that are going to be
conducted in 2018; A significant jump in observers by 200 than previously
observed last time around in 2011. Come 2018, it is widely observed that the
country is going to witness four different elections; municipal, parliamentary,
senatorial and the presidential election.
Ngwa Elvis, Asst. Executive
Director of Reach out Cameroon encourage the various participants to implement
what they have learned in their communities so as to continue the sensitization
campaign. “We want the various political
parties in the division to build the idea of collective action. We want them to
go back to the community with the knowledge on how to mobilize their citizens. It
is a team work. If we get everyone on board, they get to vote and protect their
votes then the issue of crying foul and election rigging will be a thing of the
past”.
“The aim of this workshop was to
reinforce the democracy in Cameroon and to build the capacity of CSOs,
political elites and the media. We want a situation where those elected by the
population can give accounts of whatever they have done to better the life of
the population. We don’t want a situation where some political parties only spring
up on the eve of elections with bags of rice, salts in order to convince the
population to vote them in power”.
At the end of the workshop,
certificates were handed down to the various participants with their wish being
to continuously having such trainings and workshops.
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