The event, which targets 40 participants from the country's five regions, seeks to build the capacity of youth leaders with media and information literacy (MIL) skills and relevance to democracy and good governance.
It also aims to equip the participants with an acceptable degree of skills to evaluate, understand and criticize media and media content in order to know what is fake from accurate, and differentiate between paid media propaganda and news.
Speaking at the opening ceremony, Patrick Mc Carthy, representative of the UN Coordinator, said that the training is part of a UN Peace Building Fund project entitled “Young Women and Men as Stakeholders in Ensuring Peaceful Democratic Processes and as Advocates for the Prevention of Violence and Hate Speech” that is being implemented by UNESCO, UNDP and UNFPA in collaboration with the Government of The Gambia.
"Its strategic objective is to enhance youth participation in governance and peaceful democratic processes and to strengthen their capacities as advocates against hate speech and as agents of conflict prevention. It follows, therefore, that strengthening the capacities of youth leaders in Media and Information Literacy would be an integral part of the project."
He explained that Media and Information Literacy is globally recognised as an educational area that needs to be promoted, particularly when aiming at building understanding between individuals from different religious and cultural backgrounds while reiterating that the training is also designed to equip youth leaders with a range of competencies that will allow them to seek, critically evaluate and contribute to information online and offline.
"The implementation of this initiative is guided by three objectives which are to enhance the understanding of youth leaders on media and information literacy, and its importance and relevance to democracy and good governance; to build the skills of youth leaders in analysing media and media content, and to equip youth leaders with the know-how to examine sponsored and unsponsored media messages and their goals."
Caroline Anipah, Deputy Director for Verification and Media Literacy Centre for Journalism Innovation and Development, said information disorder is generally divided into three strands, which include misinformation, disinformation, and Mal information.
She added that information disorder has been with us from the beginning of time, saying what is new is the evolution of technologies that allow mass information disorder to spread quickly and faster, with often gravely pernicious effects on individuals, businesses, and democratic communities.
"Policymakers, the world over, grapple with the question of how to curb information disorder. Take the regulation of social media across Europe, the Twitter ban in Nigeria, and closer to home, the shutting down the whole internet as on the eve of the last Yaya Jammeh election."
“But digital authoritarianism comes at a grave cost that free society cannot afford. She continued that supply-side approaches such as Dictatorial policy that silences misinformation could also be weaponised by political actors to silence truth and promote disinformation.”
Omar Bah, representative of the National Youth Council, said it is time for young people to take the lead role in terms of harmonising democracy and the peace of the country that everyone enjoys now.
"Learn skills and development should be in our minds and put it into practice. NYC is pleased to partner with UNESCO and the Centre for Journalism and Innovation to see young people take the leadership role in terms of disseminating information that is relevant to peace-building and nurturing the democratisation."
