About 60 youth activists in trade and development advocacy in Africa are attending a five-day training workshop in Accra to build their capacity on trade and development issues.Dubbed the 'Cadre school on "Trade and Development Advocacy in Africa,' the weeklong school pilot programme seeks to contribute to building skills and knowledge of young activists in trade and develop­ment advocacy in Africa.It is jointly organised by EN­DA-CACID, SEATINI-Uganda, and Third World Network-Africa, under the auspices of Africa Trade Network (ATN).The participants will interact with resource persons drawn from a pool of activist scholars who have gained rich and vast experiences from years of work on Africa's development.The Coordinator of TWN-Afri­ca, Dr Yao Graham, said the EN­DA-CACID training programme was designed to build knowledge on specific issues and to create a space for critical reflection, historical awareness, and ideological clarity.He said the programme was meant to help to rekindle old alli­ances, form new ones, and develop the uni­fied strategies needed to respond to today's challenges."Ultimately, the goal is to empower African activists and citizens to influence the restructuring of global power and the economy in ways that benefit the continent.

The training is a starting point for deeper collaboration and a renewed push for African agency," he said.The Coordinator said the battle in the current world was not only about policies but also about ideas and said, the programme would help shift Africa from a passive site of global contestation to an asser­tive actor shaping its own destiny."The dominance of neoliberal­ism continues to shape how prob­lems and solutions are understood.

To challenge the status quo, Afri­can civil society must cultivate and promote alternative worldviews.

This requires revisiting history and understanding how past struggles shaped current realities.