Strengthening Local Capacities for Peace

The project will be implemented in Huruma and D-Block in Uasin Gishu County and will directly target the following groups: members of Huruma and D-Block communities, the County Government of Uasin Gishu, the National Government, and non-state actors (agencies, civil society organization, religious groups and citizen groups’ representatives).

The project, supported by GIZ-CPS, focuses on enhancing peaceful coexistence by amplifying community voices and building their capacity to meaningfully participate and influence peace processes. Its goal is to promote peaceful coexistence among IDPs and host communities in Huruma and D-Block through amplified community voice and capacity development. The project contributes to the prevention of violent conflict, thereby preventing possibilities of new internal displacements, by promoting non-violent conflict transformation for positive social change.  Using a people-driven approach, the project will seek to achieve this by pursuing the following outcomes:

  1. Enhanced meaningful community participation in local peacebuilding processes in Huruma and D-Block
  2. Enhanced capacity of the local administration, county peace committee and council of elders in mediation, conflict transformation and early warning and response mechanisms.
  3. Strengthened interlinkages between the County Government of Uasin Gishu, non-state actors and D-Block community.
  4. Strengthened community awareness and knowledge on internal displacement.

The project supports community dialogue processes in Huruma and D-Block for inclusive identity formation; bolsters interlinkages between the community and state and non-state actors; and builds the capacity of local authorities, local peace actors and opinion leaders on conflict transformation. The project adopts a preventative rather than a reactive approach to peacebuilding hence its initiatives channel efforts and resources towards supporting bottom up peacebuilding by ensuring that peacebuilding processes are locally owned, managed and implemented.

The project takes on a people-centred approach, that is, it is conceptualized around context-specific needs and experiences of local residents and is largely implemented at community level. It strives to give Huruma and D-Block communities a voice, recognizing them as that the starting point of the project’s interventions. The project engages relevant stakeholders in the planning, execution and evaluation stages of the project’s life cycle. This multi-stakeholder engagement also seeks to leverage on existing local structures and ongoing peace work by other agencies/organizations. To ensure gender-sensitivity and inclusivity, both genders and marginalized community groups (women, youths and persons with disabilities) are well represented in the project’s activities – being cognizant of the role inclusivity plays in the achievement of the project’s goal.