The Director General of the Institute for Peace and Conflict Resolution (IPCR), Prof Oshita O. Oshita has said that lack of resources has been the greatest problem hindering the activities of the organization. He made this statement while responding to questions from members of Correspondent Chapel of Nigerian Union of Journalists (NUJ), Abuja.
He said that though the impact of his organization’s activities might not have been making the required impact in the hinterland due to lack of resources, yet the organization has impacted immensely on the sociopolitical lives of Nigerians. He cited an example of how IPCR made case for the Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs) to vote during the last general election in the country.
The members of Correspondent Chapel, Abuja led by their chairman, Mr. Raphael Ekpang, had gone on courtesy visit to IPCR to seek areas of collaboration. Mr. Ekpang in his presentation has asked the organization to partner with journalists in the area of capacity building by training journalist in conflict reporting. He said this will go a long way in bringing the activities of the IPCR to the public accurately and according to international best practices in conflict management.
Responding to the request made by the chairman, the DG Prof Oshita O. Oshita acknowledged the importance of journalist in the society and said that his organization will partner with journalists in capacity building. He said the need to involve journalists and other stakeholders in conflict resolution stems from the fact that peace work is not something an organization can do alone. He enjoined journalist to be part of peace dissemination and promised that his organization will go into partnership with journalists. “Be confident that we will partner with you for us to see how far we can go in eliminating conflict in the country”, he said.
On what effort the organization is making to inculcate peace in our youth, the Director, Conflict Resolution in IPCR, Mr. Peter Okpara said the organization has been able to incorporate peace study in the syllabus of JSS2 which is, Introduction of Peace and Conflict Studies.
urbanpaparazzionline.com 