The opening speech was delivered by the political scientist Dr. Geoffrey Kouao who highlighted the different aspects and challenges of young people's political participation and the ways in which their concerns are taken into account in society. Dr. Kouao first defined the key concepts of politics and youth and explained the importance of young people's political involvement. In his opinion, young people contribute a lot to Ivorian society, particularly in terms of innovation, creativity and new socio-political perspectives. He emphasised that the participation of young people in a democracy promotes active citizenship, strengthens social responsibility and helps to consolidate democratic processes and institutions.
Afterwards the youth representatives of the political parties RHDP (Rassemblement des Houphouëtistes pour la Démocratie et la Paix), PDCI-RDA (Parti Démocratique de la Côte d'Ivoire - Rassemblement Démocratique Africain), FPI (Front Populaire Ivoirien) as well as of civil society and of the FESCI (Fédération estudiantine et scolaire de la Côte d'Ivoire) were given the opportunity to take stock of the current living conditions of young people in Côte d’Ivoire. Through group work, concrete proposals were drawn up for taking better account of young people's concerns in the various party programmes.
The participants made, amongst others, the following recommendations to the government and all those who bear political responsibility:
- To restructure the education system to better prepare pupils and students for the future labour market
- To improve the transparency of the entrance examinations ("concours") of the public administration and of all other tendering processes
- In order to preserve peace and ensure peaceful presidential elections in October 2020, political actors should abstain from manipulating young people for political ends
- Young people should take responsibility, have a strong work ethic and should not let themselves be manipulated by political actors
The recommandations were summarised in a consolidated list which the participants of the "Political Academy" make available to all political actors.
Topics
Child poverty: causes, effects, ways out
Mandatory counseling in pregnancy conflicts
Liberalization approaches based on reproductive self-determination and their possible consequences
Constitutional limits of a reform of §§ 218 ff. of the Criminal Code
Self-determination, criminalization and mandatory counselling