Programme leads ready to deliver OCP in East Africa

"Our main gain from this workshop was a new desire to focus on how and where the most change can be made within our respective NPCs regard the three OCP target areas."

Twelve representatives from six countries East Africa will soon start delivering the national workshops of the Organisational Capacity Programme in their countries. From 18-21 April, they have gathered in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania, for the first OCP level 1 training workshop in the region.

During the four-day workshop programme leads from Ethiopia, Kenya, Rwanda, Somalia, Tanzania and Uganda discussed their National Paralympic Committee’s governance, membership structure, marketing and athlete development. Earlier this year, in February, some of them had also attended the launch meeting of OCP level 1 in Kigali, Rwanda.

During the workshop, the NPCs focused their discussions on their common challenges and goals, especially regarding their membership structure, funding and recognition from their government. Programme leads will now be able to start their national OCP workshops, which will be focused at first on their membership structure.

Hosts NPC Tanzania also organised a visit to the Jakaya M Kikwete Youth Park, where a sponsored Para sports programme for primary schools takes place.

Ali Ahmed Mohamud, Secretary General of NPC Somalia, said: “Our main gain from this workshop was a new desire to focus on how and where the most change can be made within our respective NPCs regard the three OCP target areas. Using the skills and experience we got, we can really change our NPCs.”

NPC Tunisia’s sport director Marwen Ghali, an educator trained by the IPC Academy, was one of the facilitators who shared his knowledge of sport development and athlete qualification pathways with the participants. “I would like to thank the Agitos Foundation for giving the chance to participate in this workshop and share experiences with the others. I think that we have all learned from each other during these days”, he said.

The Organisational Capacity Programme is an Agitos Foundation initiative to help National Paralympic Committees by encouraging their increased professionalism, more local support from governments, corporates and development agencies, new local partnerships and better visibility. This is the eighth group of countries to benefit from the programme, which started in February 2014.

The OCP is supported by the NPC Development Programme, which aims to build capacity within National Paralympic Committees around the world. Supported by the IPC’s Worldwide Paralympic Partnership with Toyota, the programme started in 2017 and will run until 2024 and will reach over 140 countries.