From the 24th to 26th of June 2024, the Ford Foundation’s Southern Africa office held its first partners meeting since the Covid-19 pandemic. The convening’s theme was Embracing Pause for Insightful Futures. The event was attended by at least 200 participants from the partner organisations in the region. SIVIO Institute was among the partner organisations that attended the meeting with the Executive Director, Dr Murisa, sitting on a panel on the first day’s session. The panel discussed the coalition and the path ahead for South Africa and the region and Dr Murisa shared insights based on the Zimbabwean experience of the Government of national unity from 2009 to 2013. The discussion was timeous as South Africa had just announced its 2024 presidential election results, with the historically dominant ANC gaining managing 40% of the national votes down from a previous dominance of 60%.
Day two ushered participants to a rare exercise to deeply understand the opportunities and challenges confronting Civil Society. Participants were put in clusters according to the main thematic areas supported by the Ford Foundation. The themes were Civic Engagement, Gender, Racial & Ethnic Justice, Natural Resources and Climate Change, Good neighbourhood committee and Philanthropy.
On the last day, the Executive Director joined the Natural Resources and Climate Change group to discuss how to center “just” in the just transitions discourse while the coordinator for philanthropy and communities joined the Civic Engagement group to discuss reimagining the future of civil society.
The convening placed an enormous emphasis on wellness, as there were sessions designed to provide participants with tools for analysing and understanding some of the challenges they face. The session dubbed “An Introduction to Trauma Informed Approaches” was also designed for practitioners to identify their traumas and triggers in order to address and handle mental health and wellness better. There was an acknowledgement of the bearing that mental health has on the delivery of the important work that practitioners in various organisations do. As the convening theme was embracing pause for insightful futures, there is a need to press pause, reflect and refocus. This coincided well with the season SIVIO Institute has been in, in the month of June where spent time reflecting, rejuvenating and refocusing for better impact.
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