The Executive Secretary of the Intergovernmental Authority on Development (IGAD) Ambassador Mahboub Maalim, signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) withDirector General for Development Cooperation-Federal Ministry for Europe, Integration and Foreign Affairs of the Republic of Austria Ambassador Peter Launsky, at IGAD office in Addis Ababa on 14 July 2015.

The MoU makes Austria a Lead Development Partner (LDP) for the Rapid Response Fund (RRF) and Early Warning and Response Interventions by IGAD’s Conflict Early Warning And Response Mechanism (CEWARN).

Ambassador Maalim highlighted how important the MoU was for IGAD and thanked the Austrian government for the support provided in fostering peace. The signing ceremony was also preceded by briefings by IGAD officials on CEWARN’s operations as well as IGAD’s support in restoring peace and stability in Somalia and South Sudan.

IGAD’s Conflict Early Warning and Response Mechanism (CEWARN) was set up in 2002 as a specialized unit to provide data-based conflict early warning information and analysis to government and non-government actors in IGAD Member States.

In 2009, CEWARN set up the Rapid Response Fund (RRF) as a multi-donors basket fund to support locally-driven crisis response projects that contain the spread and escalation of violent conflicts across the borders of Ethiopia-Djibouti; Ethiopia-Kenya-South Sudan-Uganda; as well as Ethiopia-Kenya-Somalia. Projects supported by the RRF range from short-term peace dialogues to modest development projects that provide peace dividends to communities affected by conflict.

In line with CEWARN’s strategic aim of promoting proactive response to violent conflicts in the region, these projects are also intended to catalyze long-term structural and policy response to conflicts.

CEWARN requires the services of a qualified media practitioner/ expert to undertake a scoping study of the media landscape in South Sudan and identify opportunities for CEWARN’s closer engagement with South Sudanese Media.

Deadline for application: 9 July 2015

Please refer to Terms of reference for details and application guidelines.

The IGAD communications team convened to review the IGAD Corporate Communications Strategy and to develop action plans with the aim of making IGAD Communications more effective and enhancing IGAD’s visibility on 8-11 June 2015 in Nanyuki, Kenya.

The meeting brought together communications team members from the IGAD Secretariat in Djibouti and specialized offices including CEWARN; IGAD Centre for Pastoral Areas and Livestock Development (ICPALD); IGAD Climate Prediction and Application Center (ICPAC); IGAD Security Sector Programme (ISSP) as well as the Office of the IGAD Special Envoys for South Sudan (OSSES).

The team appraised the IGAD corporate communication strategy and identified areas for improvement. The team also appraised a guideline developed to ensure a standardized usage of IGAD’s visual identity across the institution’s units.

Furthermore, the team identified and devised plans around upcoming opportunities for publicity such as IGAD’s 30th anniversary in January 2016. Other key themes of discussion were on how to devise innovative ways of attracting sufficient funds for communications activities; effective utilization of technology for internal and external communications as well the need to undertake regular audience surveys to obtain feedback from external stakeholders.

The CEWARN team held a validation meeting of its draft regional resource mobilization strategy on 23-25 April 2015 in Addis Ababa. CEWARN with the support of a resource mobilization expert has developed a regional Resource Mobilization strategy to ensure a substantial boost in institutional development and increased programmatic budgetary allocations across the mechanism. This is in line with the demands of the CEWARN 2012-2019 strategy framework.

The strategy will guide CEWARN on a proactive engagement with a wider base of potential partners and a more innovative and consistent engagement with Member States towards a resilient financial position. The regional strategy will also inform CEWARN’s support to national Conflict Early Warning and Response Units (CEWERUs) in developing respective national resource mobilization strategies.

The CEWARN team reviewed the draft strategy and developed a step-by-step implementation plan for 2015/16 that will guide CEWARN roll out its resource mobilization efforts.

The CEWARN team and representatives of Virtual Research Associates, a US based firm, convened on 30 April 2015 to work on an enhanced CEWARN Reporter tool for data collection and analysis. The CEWARN reporter, which is a software tool that allows CEWARN to receive, categorize and do preliminary analysis of vast amounts of early warning data from member states, has been in use for over a decade.

CEWARN is currently engaged in extensive reviews on the CEWARN Reporter to expand its utility in line with CEWARN’s expanded operational mandate of covering a wide range of conflict typologies and geographic areas.

The latest model of the CEWARN reporter will enable the mechanism to streamline diverse information sources including: community-level data collection through a limited SMS-based crowd sourcing; incident reports and weekly situation reports from partners at local and national levels; media reports and structural data among others. The newer model is also designed to be user-friendly and has state-of-the-art data visualization functions.

Officials of the United Nations Department of Political Affairs and IGAD Peace and Security Division as well as Heads of IGAD specialized Units including CEWARN convened on 21-23 April 2015 in Addis Ababa finalize a Joint Framework for institutionalizing collaboration and partnership between IGAD and the UN on Peace and Security issues in the IGAD region.

The envisaged framework outlines some key areas of collaboration including: conflict prevention and management (i.e. early warning, early response, and Mediation); democracy and good governance; elections and election related issues; emerging, evolving, and existing security threats in the region( such as violent extremism and terrorism); resource mobilization; cross-cutting issues (eg. capacity / relationship building and gender); and potential UN capacity support to the IGAD Department of Peace and Security.

A high-level Dialogue between the UN and IGAD is scheduled to be held in November 2015 to follow up on the finalization and implementation of the collaboration framework.

The South Sudan CEWERU and CEWARN co-convened a workshop to boost Monitoring, Evaluation and reporting systems of the south Sudan CEWERU on 30 May – 1 June 2015 in Magwi County. The main aim of the workshop which drew together 25 participants, was to strengthen the capacity of South Sudan CEWERU members in effectively monitoring, evaluating and reporting their conflict prevention/mitigation interventions. Participants included members of the South Sudan CEWERU Steering Committee, representatives the South Sudan Peace and Reconciliation Commission (SSPRC); Technical Teams from the 10 States of South Sudan, County Peace and Reconciliation Members (CPRMs) as well as representatives of UNMISS.

During the workshop the participants reviewed the South Sudan CEWERU’s 2013-2015 Strategy and developed a results framework for 2016-2019. The results framework intends to improve the quality of reporting on conflict prevention and mitigation efforts of the CEWERU by capturing more clearly the linkage between the CEWERU’s interventions and the intended results of /mitigating conflict.

The IGAD Council of Ministers, under the Chairmanship of H.E. Dr. Tedros Adenhom, Foreign Minister of the Federal Democratic Republic of Ethiopia convened on the sidelines of the 25th Meeting of the African Union Assembly of Heads of State and Government in Johannesburg, South Africa, to deliberate on the situation in South Sudan. This follows the adjournment of the Mediation process on 6 March and a consultation with the key negotiators in June 2015.

Key on the Agenda of the Council of Ministers meeting was a progress update from the Chairperson of the Special Envoys, Amb. Seyoum Mesfin; discussion on the overall situation in South Sudan and its regional implication, as well as charting a way forward to re-invigorate the IGAD Mediation process.

In this regard, the council adopted the new Mediation mechanism, known as IGAD PLUS, composed of IGAD and the African Union, and Algeria, Chad, Nigeria, Rwanda, and South Africa. In addition, China, Troika, the EU, the UN, and IPF are also represented in the new formulation.

Consequently, a meeting of the Peace and Security Council of the African Union that convened at Heads of State level on 13 June 2015 launched the African Union High-level Adhoc Committee (AU HLAC) on South Sudan, following which the African side of IGAD PLUS met under the Chairmanship of H.E. Hailemariam Dessalegn, Prime Minister of the Federal Democratic Republic of Ethiopia and current Chair of the IGAD Assembly of Heads of State. Please refer to links for the report and communiqué issued by the AU PSC Meeting.

Photo courtesy: AU Peace and Security Department

CEWARN‬ Director Mr. Richard Barno and team held a two-day retreat with Heads of CEWARN national Conflict Early Warning and Response Units (‪CEWERUs‬) of ‪‎Djibouti‬, ‪Ethiopia‬, ‎Kenya‬, Somalia‬,‎SouthSudan‬, ‎Sudan‬ and ‪Uganda‬ on 28-29 May 2015 in Mombassa, Kenya. The main agenda of the retreat was to review the progress in the implementation of the CEWARN 2012-19 strategy framework and tackle some of the challenges facing the new data collection and analysis system.

Some of the concerns discussed include the timely roll out of the expanded CEWARN Reporter which is a software tool and an essential part of CEWARN’s regional data collection and analysis system; the integration of sms-based data collection system into the CEWARN Reporter as well as the expansion of CEWARN’s local-level structures to include civil society networks that will be relied on for data collection.

In terms of strengthening national CEWERUs, discussions focused on increasing human resources, revamping CEWERU steering committees as well as the development of effective national Resource Mobilization strategies. In addition, a session was devoted to appraise the progress of implementation of conflict prevention projects supported by CEWARN’s regional response facility called the Rapid Response Fund (RRF).

CEWARN and the IGAD Mediation Support Unit (MSU) co-convened training on Conflict-Sensitive Reporting and Peace Messaging for South Sudanese Journalists from 18-22 May 2015 in Juba.

The main aim of the training that brought together 21 South Sudanese journalists working in Television, Radio, Newspaper and Web-based media outlets from across South Sudan, was to equip them with critical skills that will enable them to execute their duties effectively in situations of conflict.

 The training was also aimed at exposing the journalists to IGAD’s work in promoting peace and security in the region as well as co-opting them into a long-term partnership for peace building and conflict resolution in the IGAD region.

During the training, CEWARN Director Mr. Richard Barno engaged the journalists on responsible reporting in conflict situations and presented to them CEWARN’s regional operations as well as the mechanism’s tools, architecture, networks and the huge significance of the media in CEWARN’s operations.

The subjects that were covered by the five-day training include: Understanding Conflict; Conflict Analysis; Theory and Practice of Conflict Prevention, Management and Resolution (CPMR); Mediation Processes; Media and Conflict; Evolution of Media theory; Media Ethics and code of Conduct; as well as skills in conflict sensitive reporting and peace messaging.

CEWARN and MSU intend to conduct similar training programmes in other IGAD Member states as well as expand the programme towards progressively building a robust partnership with media in regional preventive diplomacy efforts.