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Andre Tipoki, CYF6 delegate organises a Solomon Islands National Youth Forum

17 January 2008

A successful National Youth Forum organised by the Solomon Islands youth representatives to the 6 Commonwealth Youth Forum (CYF6) Mr. Andre Tipoki, was held in Honiara, the capital of Solomon Islands on 12 December 2007

With the theme ‘Empowering Youths as Partners in Development’ the one day Youth Forum was attended by 60 young people representing national youth stakeholders including churches, government ministries, local, regional and international NGOs.

The youth forum was a good example of partnership by organisations to collaborate in organising a youth activity together. Also in attendance was the Consular for the United States of America in Solomon Islands, the Permanent Secretary for Women, Youth and Children Affairs (MWYCA) and the Permanent Secretary for Home Affairs.

The CYP South Pacific Centre assisted with the organising of the forum as well as availing its conference centre for the forum to be hosted.

Mr. Tipoki said he intended the youth forum to be an opportunity to relate to the young people of Solomon Islands his experience at the CYF6 and to highlight some of the outcomes from the CYF6 which related to youth development in Solomon Islands. He was hopeful the information would help other young people’s lives and the work they do. Mr Tipoki was concerned that often times young people return from international and regional fora without passing on the knowledge and experience they gained from these meetings.

The Forum was also an opportunity for other youth stakeholders to share some of their work activities and experiences. The outgoing Solomon Islands Regional Youth Caucus (RYC) member, Mr. Jasper Anisi presented a report on his experience as a member of the Regional Youth Caucus, a UNICEF youth officer also spoke on the organisation’s youth work, the General Secretary of the Solomon Islands National Youth Congress made a presentation on the Solomon Islands National Youth Policy and the Regional Director of the CYP SP Centre launched the Commonwealth Plan of Action for Youth Empowerment (PAYE).

During her opening remarks, Ms. Ethel Sigimanu, the Permanent Secretary of the MWYCA said that working in isolation is detrimental to the advancement of youth work and emphasised the imperativeness of working in partnership.

In his presentation, Mr. Tipoki gave a brief background on the CYF6. He said the forum was the biggest that he has attended and was happy to just listen and learn during the big plenary sessions. He found the workshops organised during the CYF6 to be more beneficial for him because they were smaller and enabled individuals like him to make their contributions. It was at these workshops too that skills were imparted and knowledge gained.

Providing an example, Mr. Tipoki said that he found a workshop on conflict resolution to be very useful. He said that conflict does not only refer to wars and armed situations but also to personal conflicts and those experienced in one’s work environment. He learnt that sometimes conflict situations arise because a youth leader is not aware of his/her audience or target group. Hence what is thought to be a ‘harmless’ statement could actually give rise to misunderstanding and end in a conflict situation. In such a case a good strategy would be for youth leaders to know their audience and target groups well before raising subjects with them.

Another topic of interest to him was Social Transformation in Leadership. During this workshop session, Mr. Tipoki said he learnt about the different leadership styles and how to lead in light of the constantly changing youth culture. He said to be a good leader one must be well versed with the young people’s culture so as to apply strategies that will enable their responsiveness.

His only comment on the CYF6 was that the workshop times were too short and workshop organisers did not leave materials with participants that they could use should they want to hold such a workshop in their own countries. Mr. Tipoki called on the Commonwealth governments of the Pacific to increase their youth delegates to future CYF’s.

The Permanent Secretary of the Ministry of Home Affairs, Mr. Fred Fakari’i acknowledged the presentation by the Director and for Mr. Tipoki for organising the youth forum. He said that the PAYE is vital to youth development in Solomon Islands and called for government representatives and non-government youth stakeholders to participate in these kinds of forums and to be knowledgeable about the PAYE so to enable it to be adopted and implemented in their own programmes.

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