Makerere Rotary Peace Centre now a benchmarking spot
by John Musinguzi · The ObserverThe Rotary Peace Centre at Makerere University has made tremendous achievements in design, programmes and standards that it has become a beacon being benchmarked by global institutions and individuals.
This milestone was emphasized by Prof Bantebya Kyomuhendo and Dr Mike Sebalu, both members of the centre’s Advisory board. The duo spoke at the centre’s sixth capstone conference whereby 21 peace fellows presented their project designs, outcomes and plans for sustainability, and received certificates of completion at the School of Public Health auditorium, Makerere University on October 18, 2024.
The ceremony also included welcoming members of the eighth cohort; the seventh cohort is in the field doing social change initiative projects. The graduating fellows came from Cameroon, 2; Egypt, 1; Ethiopia, 1; Kenya, 1; Lesotho, 1; Liberia, 2; Malawi, 1; Nigeria, 4; Rwanda, 1; Sierra Leone, 1; Uganda, 3; and Zimbabwe, 3.
They go away with a one-year postgraduate diploma in Peacebuilding, Conflict Transformation and Development, after spending two weeks on online course, 10 weeks of on-site studies at Makerere, and nine months of fieldwork in peace and social change research projects.
Also in attendance were over 20 senior officers of Uganda Police Force and Uganda Prisons Service in the fourth intake of the master’s degree in Peace and Conflict Studies of Makerere University, offered at the Police Senior Command and Staff College Bwebajja.
Kyomuhendo said since inception in 2020, the centre, which receives hundreds of applications every year, has admitted 151 fellows (including cohort 8) from 45 countries in the world. She said cohort 6 admitted fellows from strictly the African continent as an experiment.
The centre has already admitted fellows for cohort 9 (2025) and cohort 10 (2026), 20 fellows apiece. Sebalu said because of the good
work the peace centre has been doing, Rotary International presidents have been frequenting Uganda; the current president Stephanie Urchick will visit Uganda and lead a peace walk on January 11, 2025.
She will also attend a peace concert and give a keynote speech at a peace symposium. The peace walk will flag off and end at Makerere University. Urchick will then continue to Turkey to open the eighth Rotary peace centre in the world; it was designed after the Makerere centre model.