BUILDING RELATIONSHIPS FOR PEACE

1. WEST AFRICA NETWORK FOR PEACEBUILDING BUILDING RELATIONSHIPS FOR PEACE ORGANISATION PROFILE

2. Welcome to WANEP!

3. ABOUT WANEP • The West Africa Network for Peacebuilding (WANEP) is a leading Regional Peacebuilding organization founded in 1998 in response to civil wars that plagued West Africa in the 1990s. • Over the years, WANEP has succeeded in establishing a strong national network in every Member State of ECOWAS with over 500 member organizations across West Africa.

4. ABOUT WANEP WANEP places special focus on collaborative approaches to conflict prevention, and peacebuilding, working with diverse actors from civil society, governments, intergovernmental bodies, women groups and other partners in a bid to establish a platform for dialogue, experience sharing and learning, thereby complementing efforts at ensuring sustainable peace and development in West Africa and beyond.

5. ABOUT WANEP In 2002, WANEP entered into a historic partnership with the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) an inter-governmental structure in the implementation of a regional early warning and response system (ECOWARN).

6. ABOUT WANEP A memorandum of understanding between WANEP and ECOWAS was signed in 2004 for five years, and has since been renewed for another 5 years. This partnership constitutes a major strategic achievement for WANEP and West Africa civil society as it offers the much desired opportunity to contribute to Track I response to conflicts and policy debates.

7. ABOUT WANEP At the continental level, WANEP is a member of the Peace and Security cluster of the African Union’s (AU) Economic, Social and Cultural Council –ECOSOCC representing West Africa. At international level, WANEP has a Special Consultative Status with the United Nations Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC) and is the West Africa Regional Representative of the Global Partnership for the Prevention of Armed Conflict (GPPAC). WANEP is the Chair of GPPAC.

8. ABOUT WANEP WANEP provides professional courses in conflict prevention and peacebuilding informed by several years of practice experience to governments, businesses, and practitioners throughout the sub-region and beyond. Underlying its work is a commitment to professionalism and a dedication to a world of mutual respect, tolerance and peace.

9. REGIONAL REACH, NATIONAL PRESENCE WANEP adopts a two-pronged approach in programming: a national approach led by the national secretariat and a regional approach coordinatedfrom the regional secretariat. At national level, the national networks assume responsibility and ownership of their programme with technical support from the regional secretariat. WANEP principles emphasize ownership of peacebuilding practice. Given that the national networks understand their situation and realities , they are in a better position to engage their communities and government and intervene effectively.

10. REGIONAL REACH, NATIONAL PRESENCE Our national networks facilitate a more bottom-up approach and allow their intervention to reflect the peculiarities of the issues of human security in their various countries. At regional level, it is acknowledged that factors that fuel conflicts and their escalation in our sub-region are no respecters of artificially-imposed boundaries. Our regional programmes cut across national networks and are designed to increase leverage in engaging diverse actors at regional and international level. Overall, WANEP's strategy is to locate, empower, support and accompany local actors as they respond to conflicts within their communities.

11. Map of West Africa

12. ORGANISATIONAL COMMITMENT Vision:A West Africa region characterized by just and peaceful communities where the dignity of the human person is paramount and where the people can meet their basic human needs and decide their own direction.

13. ORGANISATIONAL COMMITMENT Mission: To enable and facilitate the development of mechanisms for cooperation among civil society-based peacebuilding practitioners and organizations in West Africa by promoting cooperative responses to violent conflicts; providing the structure through which these practitioners and institutions will regularly exchange experience and information on issues of peacebuilding, conflict transformation, social, religious and political reconciliation; and promoting West Africa’s social cultural values as resources for peacebuilding.

14. WANEP PROGRAM PORTFOLIO • WARN • WAPI • WIPNET • CSDG • NAPE • SPECIAL INTERVENTIONS Our regional programmes cut across national networks and are designed to increase leverage in engaging diverse actors at regional and international level. Overall, WANEP's strategy is to locate, empower, support and accompany local actors as they respond to conflicts within their communities.

15. WARN WARN is an integral of WANEP’s overall conflict prevention mechanism. It works to enhance human security in West Africa by monitoring and reporting socio-political situations that could degenerate into violent and destructive conflicts. WARN informs policy makers on options for response on one hand and WANEP’s response strategies on the other hand. The programme (NEWS) is setting up community-based conflict monitoring systems with local monitors to produce conflict and peace assessment reports, early warning reports, and policy briefs which are widely disseminated to CSOs, governments, intergovernmental bodies, partners, and UN agencies.

16. WAPI Launched in 2002, WAPI seeks to increase the knowledge base in West Africa by contributing to research and enhancing the skills and expertise of individuals, organizations and businesses in the area of conflict prevention and peacebuilding. As at 2010 WANEP has trained and strengthened the capacity of over 400 practitioners and regional bodies including ECOWAS and UN agencies.

17. WIPNET The Women in Peacebuilding Network (WIPNET) Programme was launched in November 2001 with the aim of building the capacity of women to enhance their roles in peacebuilding and post conflict reconstruction in West Africa. WANEP through WIPNET seeks to increase the number of trained women practitioners in peacebuilding as trainers, researchers, mediators and advocates. Through community mobilization and other innovative platforms, WANEP strives to provide a forum for women at the grassroots to amplify their voices on issues of peace and human security.Under the WIPNET programme, WANEP promotes mainstreaming gender perspective into peacebuilding and conflict prevention frameworks at community, national and regional level.

18. CSDG • The Civil Society Coordination and Democratic Governance programme provides an integrated platform for WANEP engagement with diverse stakeholders to promote peaceful democratic transition, conflict resolving governance and enhance democratic structures, institutions and practices at various levels. • Under the CSDG, WANEP partners with CSOs to monitor and mitigate election-related conflicts with the view to promote dialogue and peaceful elections.

19. NAPE Launched in May 2000, NAPE seeks to promote the culture of nonviolence and peace within West African communities with particular focus on children and youth in schools and in the informal sector. The programme promotes peer mediation and peace clubs in schools as well as peace education curriculums at various levels: schools, colleges, teachers’ training colleges, universities and policy level. Peacebuilding is not an event but rather a process which when properly inculcated in the minds and comportment of children, youth and adult; they will become agents of change – this is the philosophy behind NAPE.

20. SPECIAL INTERVENTIONS The Special Intervention initiatives dimension under this programme mainly aims at enabling WANEP’s involvement in search of a peaceful settlement of crisis at its nascent state. This programme promotes inter and intra communal dialogue and peaceful coexistence. It provides expertise and support for dialogue as well as enhance the mediated capacities of communities.

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