In preparation for the referendum on southern independence scheduled for January 2011, JRS recently trained 12 community peace facilitators and three government and church representatives in Nimule, Pageri and Mugali sub-counties.
During the four-day training, participants studied and discussed the 2009 referendum act in detail, learned more about the right to self-determination and looked at positive and negative examples of independence referenda around the world.
Anyanzo Charles Jacob, JRS peace education coordinator in Nimule said that the participants were expected to use the knowledge they acquired to build awareness among their fellow citizens and to help them participate successfully in next year’s referendum.
He added that a lot of civic education is needed to make people understand the meaning of the referendum and help them vote wisely. The three sub-counties comprise about 50 thousand eligible voters of which 30 thousand are women.