ABOUT THE CENTRE

BRIEF ON POLITICAL PARTIES LEADERSHIP AND POLICY DEVELOPMENT CENTRE

The National Institute with support from the Democratic Governance for Development (DGD) Project II, a programme of the United Nations Development Programme established the Political Parties Leadership and Policy Development Centre (PPLPDC) in June 2013. The Centre was established to strengthen political parties for more qualitative democratic engagements and to foster the strategic role of political parties in national development. It provides training and guidance to party leaders at national and sub-national levels and also conducts research, seminars, conferences, workshops, brainstorming and other engagements to improve party system. The National Institute considers gender equality and social inclusion critical components in the discharge of its mandate. It strongly believes that public policies and programmes in Nigeria impact citizens differently, along gender and social lines. Consequently, the National Institute ensures the integration of gender and social inclusion in project and programme design and implementation, capacity building programmes as well as in the writing of policy recommendations. The Centre since inception noted that women and youth were particularly disenfranchised within party leadership, and occupied a minimal percentage of party leadership positions and having very limited influence on party decision-making. Therefore, it envisions a party system where women, youth and PWDs are able to fully participate in national development at all levels. Its various activities therefore tend to geared towards sensitizing and mobilizing political parties to strengthened the participation of women in political process in Nigeria. Consequently, the Centre developed a curriculum to meet the training needs of political parties in at national and sub-national levels since 2014. The curriculum took into consideration gender equity and social inclusion (GESI) principles and practices. Various categories of party leaders including women, youth and people living with disabilities (PWDs) have been trained by the Centre.

OBJECTIVES

The overarching objective of the Centre is to strengthen the leadership and organizational capacities of political parties as institutional foundation of Nigeria's democracy and ensuring that political parties are policy-oriented, responsive, inclusive and more accountable to their members and the society The specific objectives are to:
1. Build a strong and well-resourced centre for leadership training and policy development for political parties in Nigeria and the West African sub-region;
2. Design training programmes and curricula for party leadership and policy development that is appropriate to the needs of political parties in Nigeria based on Nigeria's political environment;
3. Improve understanding of party development, renewal and revitalization processes, mechanisms and experiences, while enhancing advocacy, networking and collations building skills that advance core democratic values of consensus building, nonviolence, inclusion and tolerance amongst others; and
4. Build capacities of participants in strategic policy development and intensify their understanding of governance processes and respect for democratic principles, values and culture..

QUALITY OF TRAINERS

NIPSS has engaged Resource Persons to deliver training to Chairmen of all the 25 parties in the country as well as other layers of party leadership such as Secretaries, Financial Secretaries, Auditors, Treasurers, Women Leaders, Youth leaders etc. For effective delivery of the training objectives, the resource person should have either a track record of teaching and research in Political Science or related subject, or indeed be persons with practical experience in politics. Bringing together trainers from both academic and practical experience has the advantage of promoting better understanding of the material covered in both the trainers’ handbook as well as the training modules already developed by the Centre.

TRAINING CENTRE

The training will be provided at a well-furnished training hall of the PPLPDC. Each trainer will be sent by e-mail in advance of their arrival the relevant training module. Hard copies will be issued on arrival in Kuru.

MODE OF DELIVERY

The training modules were carefully crafted to allow for interaction amongst the trainees and the trainers. This means that it is envisaged to be a departure from the top-down approach in which the trainer is assumed to have a virtual monopoly of knowledge. The training approach at Kuru adopts the more realistic position that both the trainers and the trainees stand to gain a lot from the experiences and knowledge of one another, so inter-active approach to the delivery of training will be adopted. What is more, the fact that the trainer is expected to listen to opinions of the trainees could have far reaching lessons to them especially on their return to their various political parties where they would adopt the interactive approach in their dealings with their party members and staff. To facilitate the training, modern audio-visual facilities (predominantly the Power Point presentation methods) will be adopted.

TRAINING VENUE

Kuru is situated in a serene environment in the outskirts of Jos, the Plateau State Capital. Kuru (and the entire landscape of Jos) enjoys good weather conditions, with temperatures hovering well below 30⁰C for the most part of the year. For participants coming from Lagos or distant areas, access to Kuru can be gained on arrival at the Jos International Airport. In addition, good road network renders the place within easy reach for those coming from Abuja, Bauchi, Kano, Kaduna, Zaria or other neigbouring town and cities.