Internship report by Cesar da Silveira Angola2000
As part of Angola 2000, DW and ACCORD partnership I was an intern at ACCORD from October 2nd to the
12th of December 2003 under The Preventive Action Programme. During this period of time I was
familiarized with ACCORD day to day running and made crucial steps for the future development of
Angola 2000 and ACCORD partnership. The internship was part of the DFID grant agreement in which
an intern from the local partner spends a three-month period at ACCORD. I work for Angola 2000 the
Programme’s local partner in Angola.
The following lists provide the planned activities and outputs for the internship and the actual
activities undertaken.
During the time I spent at Accord, I produced a few research papers including case studies, a small
piece on Zimbabwe, and a trends report of developments within southern Africa. As a result of my
interaction with some of Accord’s best program officers and general staff members, my work improved
progressively over that period. I managed to improve my language and style, particularly in my
grasp of English as well as learned to develop a more neutral and impartial style of writing.
I had the opportunity to attend the Training for Peace in Southern Africa project: Civilian
Peacekeeping and Peace-building Course from 11-19 November 2003 held by the Peacekeeping Programme
at ACCORD. For the firs time in my live I had the opportunity to meet and interact with African
activists working positively to bring about peace and sustainability to Africa. The module, which
focused on Post-Conflict Reconstruction, captured my attention spatially because of to the current
situation in Angola. Although I had some difficulty in grasping some concepts due to the language
barrier, I was able to participate well in the preparation of the scenarios and relate the
information gained to the experiences I had in Angola. Overall I found the course beneficial, and
I was pleased to attend such a course since one of the objectives I had hoped to achieve during his
internship with ACCORD was to develop my skills, especially in conflict management.
One of my main achievements was the proposal on Peace and Human Rights Education in Angola,
which I based on my own experience and the guidelines provided by staff at ACCORD. I must thank
for the time I spent with various staff members in administration, finance, human resources and
other programmes to get a better understanding of the processes and procedures at ACCORD. I also
participated in review discussions of proposed programmes at ACCORD where I had the opportunity
to take part in strategy and conceptual design sessions for planning and developing projects that
will assist in my future work.
Planned outputs:
- Research paper on civil society interaction in Angola (Preventive Action)
- 3 sets of SADC trends pieces (Preventive Action)
- Main research paper on Zimbabwe (Research Unit/Preventive Action)
- Presentation of the main research paper at an internal staff seminar
- Proposal for Angola 2000 (Research Unit/ Preventive Action)
- 2 Case studies (Training Unit)
- Case study on peace-building challenges and prospects in Angola (Peacekeeping)
- Research paper on judicial reform in Angola (Constitutionalism)
- Short paper on political party and civil society interaction in Angola
Outputs/activities undertaken:
- Research paper on civil society interaction in Angola
- 1 set of SADC trends
- Main research paper on Zimbabwe
- Proposal for Angola 2000
- 2 Case studies (Training Unit)
- Case study on peace-building challenges and prospects in Angola (Peacekeeping)
- Research paper on judicial reform in Angola (Constitutionalism)
- Participation in review discussions for future programs
- Attendance at the Training for Peace in Southern Africa project: Civilian
- Peacekeeping and Peace-building Course, 11-19 November 2003
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