Working Toward Community Stabilisation

UNAMID’s community-based, labour-intensive projects are designed to create unique socioeconomic opportunities for Darfur’s at-risk young people, providing them with a platform to foster community development in this conflict-torn region.

By Emadeldin Rijal

Originally from El Fasher, North Darfur, Mr. Mohamed Noureldin studied graphic design at the The decade-long conflict in Darfur, which has had a devastating impact on the region’s existing infrastructure, has become a matter of growing concern for UNAMID, Sudanese institutions, nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) and United Nations (UN) agencies working in the region. This increasingly complex situation has led to an escalation of violence and massive new population displacements. Fierce competition over access to basic services and natural resources continues to impede the overall peace process. Infrastructure rehabilitation, vocational training and community stabilisation have come to be seen as effective methods to address this volatile situation.

As one aspect of its work here to rehabilitate infrastructure, offer vocational training to at-risk young people and in the end help stabilise communities, UNAMID’s Disarmament, Demobilisation and Reintegration (DDR) section has been implementing a programme called community-based, labour-intensive projects (CLIPs). Such projects fall within the framework of what has come to be known as second-generation DDR—a collection of strategies and policies designed to address peace and security at the local level to help reduce conflict and set the stage for formal DDR activities.

Because the Doha Document for Peace in Darfur (DDPD) has not yet been signed by all armed movements, meaning no formal disarmament, demobilisation and reintegration can take place, UNAMID’s DDR section has been implementing its violence-reduction strategy through CLIPs that include the construction of youth centres and schools, and involve vocational training in electronics, welding, handcrafts, brick-making and so forth. These projects focus not only on vocational skills training and in many cases facilitating infrastructure development, but also on fostering reconciliation across Darfur.

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On 25 March 2014, a group of young Darfuris participate in a training session on electronics at the Mellit Technical School in North Darfur as part of a three-month programme sponsored by UNAMID’s Disarmament, Demobilisation and Reintegration section. The Mellit programme provided vocational training in seven different fields, benefitting 150 at-risk young people in the area. Photo by Albert González Farran, UNAMID