FAWEZI National Coordinator Ms Lydia Madyirapanze and Alumni members Amanda S Mukova and Dorcas Goredema attended a Women thrive advocacy training workshop in Nairobi Kenya from June 9 -11.
The aim of the workshop was to empower girls to raise their voices and be heard in order to create a gender equal environment.

It was facilitated by Noel Schroeder from United states of America, Chrissy Hart from United States of America, Chilande Kuloba-Warria from Kenya, Martha Muhwezi from Uganda and Hendrina Givah from Malawi.
The mentors present were – FAWEZI national coordinator Lydia Madyirapanze and Christine Semambo Sempebwa from Uganda.

Uganda, The Gambia, Zambia, Rwanda, Tanzania, Nigeria, Ghana, Malawi, Kenya and Zimbabwe had two representative advocates each.

On day one -the theme was “Advocacy and gender”,
The speakers covered the issue of gender equality matters where there was an insight of understanding gender, gender inequalities, gender integration and empowering women. The issue of importance of being an advocate was covered in this session, distinguishing the advocacy forms such policy advocacy, social justice advocacy, and people-centered advocacy amongst others.

The importance of advocating for gender equality in separate countries was also discussed.

The discussion also centred on answering questions like what does advocacy mean? What does citizenship mean? How do you engage as a citizen? How do non-citizens engage? Who are the advocates in your community? What is an example of an advocacy outcome in your community? Amongst others.

Day Two-the theme was ‘Plan your advocacy’,
The participants discussed numerous topics such as setting objectives concerning gender sensitive issues.
The SMART word was used to summarise the nature of the objectives.

• Specific
• Measurable
• Achievable
• Results-oriented
• Time-oriented,

The topic of crafting of quality messages targeted to the audience as well as developing and implementing the campaign were addressed. In this regard, there were various advocacy campaigns and activities that can be done with the youths which involve the media, public and civil society which at the end of the day need to be documented, monitored and then evaluated.

Day Three-the theme was “Share your learning”,
The facilitators highlighted on matters concerning the link of actions in global opportunities such as networking and partnerships. The participants were asked to demonstrate what they had learnt through role play and also gave feed back on the workshop in general.

They were also encouraged to share stories more widely using the media.
All the participants felt the need be the voice for the girls in their respective countries.