Digitalise Youth

CFI and its partners in the consortium led by the European Partnership for Democracy are launching the Digitalise Youth project. This project falls within the Digital Democracy Initiative (DDI) with a focus on improving digital skills, promoting civic technological solutions and raising awareness as to online political stance. Bridging the gap between the tech community and the defenders of human rights, this project provides young militants and media organisations with the necessary knowledge and tools to navigate the digital ecosystem, protect themselves from surveillance and push back against misinformation. 
Digitalise Youth advocacy efforts aim to promote digital rights at local, regional and international level, by encouraging the ratification of the African Union Convention on Cyber-security and Personal Data Protection.

CFI’s initiatives aim to raise awareness among young people as to the need to exercise both vigilance and discernment when leveraging their freedom of expression on social media; develop their skills in order to push back against fake news and hate speech; and help to foster a safer, more respectful online environment by way of Media and Information Literacy (MIL).

To this purpose, CFI will be providing support for a member of the Digitalize Youth consortium, namely the World Organization of the Scout Movement (WOSM) Africa Scout Region, specifically for its digital education activities for national organisations which are part of the movement and local scout troops in 10 countries in French-speaking Africa. Training will also be organised for MIL trainers in Ethiopia, Somalia and South Sudan.

CFI will also be collaborating with MediaINK (Somalia), Digital Rights Frontlines (South Sudan) and Positive Peace for Ethiopia (Ethiopia) to build the capacity of young journalists and digital content producers on matters underpinning their profession (ethics, cybersecurity, fact-checking and inclusivity) as well as the production of top-quality content on human rights issues.