Strengthening Political Parties for Sustainable Democracy in the SADC Region Project

This project is grounded in the realisation that parties require as much nurturing and attention as other political institutions and elements of civil society. The overarching purpose is to help strengthen political parties in the SADC region. Strong political parties play a meaningful role as effective institutional guarantors for democratic consolidation and good governance. Programme activities in Botswana, Lesotho, South Africa and Swaziland aim to strengthen political parties in order to contribute towards sustainable democratic consolidation and good governance in the region. Themes include internal organisational arrangements, management and functioning of parties, gender representation, party leadership, conflict and conflict management and inter-party relations.

Objectives

• Conduct capacity building programmes in a variety of areas namely, gender representation, intra-party and inter-party democracy, outreach activities, conflict management and leadership.
• Share information on comparative experiences of political parties in the SADC region with regard their functioning, their internal democracy mechanisms and organisational arrangements and
• Promote dialogue amongst parties in order to generate regional and in-country debates on their status.

This project follows a pilot research project that focused on party public outreach programmes in Botswana, Lesotho, Namibia and Zambia. The pilot was financed by the Norwegian Centre for Human Rights (NCHR) and produced a report, Enhancing the Effectiveness of Political Parties in the SADC Region through Public Outreach Programmes.