The Fragility, Conflict and Violence forum 2016 was a platform to address the issues of fragile countries. It was a great opportunity for me to attend this event to gain knowledge and awareness. The purpose is to talk about the concerns of low income countries and the efforts developed countries are making to solve them. It was a three day event including several sessions on Childhood violence, urban violence, poverty, inequality, next generation technology, child marriages, role of youth, women rights and role of civil society.
Sri Mulyani Indrawati, Managing Director and Chief Operating Officer, The World Bank welcomed 1200 registered participant from over 100 partner organizations and Saroj Kumar Jha, Senior Director, Fragility, Conflict and Violence, The World Bank facilitated as a moderator for the session. The World Bank Group President Mr. Jim Yong Kim emphasized the importance and urgency of collective actions and the global efforts to eliminate extreme poverty by 2030.
Jan Eliasson, Deputy Secretary-General, United Nations, a part of honorable guest in the panel said “Together” is the most important word in the world to sustain peace for SDG’s. He mentioned the agenda of United Nations 70’s anniversary was focused on People, Planet, Prosperity, Peace and Partnership and it was promised by all the leaders last year to translate this agenda into worldwide national plan. Central African Republic President Catherine Samba-Panza gave her remarks on fragility and Nancy Lindborg, President of the U.S. Institute of Peace has concluded the opening plenary session by saying “We don’t have a refugee crisis. We have a fragility, conflict and violence crisis, and my great hope is we will not lose our focus on looking at the roots of that very difficult issue.”
In the very first sessions on “Urban Violence, Poverty and Inequality” the panelist Amiera Sawas presented on the “Gender performance and urban violence in Pakistan” in which she recommended the inclusion of gender empowerment programs for femininity in urban Pakistan. The panelist also talked about the material prevention in the form of employment, food and sports and crime prevention as an attachment to cultural and regulatory system of society.
In collaboration with African Development Bank the “Next Generation Technology” session provided a platform especially for the African countries to discuss about the contracts and how to manage them to end poverty by 2030. Homi Kharas from The Brookings Institution concluded the session by saying “There are some thing technology cannot change, but if people are aware it can bring pressure on leaders.”
The matter of inclusivity, peace building agreements, agenda 2030, SDG implementation and new deal were focused in the session of “Safeguarding Inclusivity and the role of Civil Society in Conflict Affected States”. It was an enlightening session on role of civil societies in inception and the concept of inclusivity in terms of accountability and tolerance. Representative from Ministry of finance, Afghanistan shared his concern on the recognition of civil society role by Government and talked about the repulsion between Government and civil society organizations as step brothers.
The Government, private sector and the civil society organizations are three main pillars of society; I believe there should be a rule of dialogue between them to work cooperatively with each other to build a peaceful society. For me civil societies should work collaboratively with the Government and should not limit their role just to service deliverance. The role of civil societies should be mobilized to the grass root level people instead of just implementing humanitarian projects. Deka, Operations Manager IIDA has concluded the session by saying “Inclusivity is important, we should legitimize the support given to grass root level, and also focus on minority and disable people rights”
With the collaboration of Club de Madrid the session on Democratic and Inclusive Leadership was a tremendous effort to enlighten the significance of inclusion, justice, human safety, poverty, political gap between countries, and the need of dialogue. I consider the lack of dialogue creates gap between countries which ultimately creates the space for violence and extremism. The session on women and children running from
violence was really heart-touching. Violence and criminal activities and increasing day by day in fragile states and the percentage of asylum cases are incredibly increasing. Women and children are the easiest target for global violence, violence of economic poverty and cultural violence in the region of Africa, Europe and America. The panel concluded the session by putting some solutions to tackle violence and humanitarian crisis.
Inspired by Iranian and American rappers, Sonita Alizadeh, Afghan rapper brought her campaign to end forced child marriages to the fragility forum. Her parents also planned marriage for her but she managed to escape eventually. She documented her story in a music video “Brides for Sale” which caught international attention to this cause.
The forum also focused on the sustainable peace through Young people leadership and meaningful participation. Enabling young people ownership, involvement in decision making on institutional level, support and establish policies that address youth needs opportunities and marginalized voices were the key talking points of the session.
The opportunity of meeting representatives of UN, International civil society organizations and The World Bank helped all the participants to learn and build and the commitment to build the peaceful society and end poverty by 2013.