By Fatou Saho
The Association of Non-Governmental Organizations has hosted a policy dialogue on education as part of the activities of the civil society organization watchdog STAR project (strengthening transparency, accountability and resilience) funded by the European Union.
Speakng at the opening, the executive director of TANGO Ndey Sireng Bakurin, said the policy dialogue is an open forum to strengthen democracy and good governance in the Gambia through evidence based approaches for advocacy on national development matters such as education amongst others.
“The TANGO policy dialogue series commenced in 2012 as an advocacy and accountability mechanism to influence public policy, advocate for reforms, hold stakeholders accountable and generate knowledge development and sharing, ” she stated.
Yadicon Njie Eribo, the chairperson of TANGO said the issue of quality teaching, learning environments and how they have impacted the performances of schools and pupils have long generated debate across the society.
“Today’s dialogue provides an opportunity for CSOs and other partners to discuss our education sector and the overall goal of the policy dialogue, is to bring key stakeholders, partners, practitioners and beneficiaries together to share ideas in discussing the issues and concerns with a view to identify prospects and challenges in education. The goal of the Star project is to establish functional CSO/NGO platform centred on evidence-based advocacy on education and peace building. The project also pays special attention to education, peace building gender, environment and climate change,” Mrs.Eribo highlighted.
As the dialogue on education came with the launch of a policy research and Journal production, James Gomez the director of research at the MOHERST has extended gratitude to the STAR project team for popularizing the National development plan across the country with a focus on education.
He said: “It is through research that we can have informed policies and be able to proffer solutions to issues”.
Gomez commended TANGO for setting up a research centre for evidence-based reporting and advocacy adding that it is a milestone for the Gambia.
