AFAI calls for Cultural Leadership Training applications

The three-year programme will lay the basis for five regional training hubs for Cultural Leadership, Train-the-Trainer and Entrepreneurship programmes. These hubs are being established by AFAI in Southern Africa, and by project partners Casamemoire in Morocco, serving North Africa; by Groupe 30 Afrique in Senegal, serving West Africa; by Doual'art in Cameroon, serving Central Africa; and by The GoDown Arts Centre in Kenya, serving East Africa.

The programme's ultimate goal is to advance the cultural dimension of development and cultural diversity in Africa through improved cultural governance. The institute proposes to capacitate skilled leadership to effectively formulate and implement policies and strategies, and to effectively manage civil society organisations and public institutions.

The programme will target leading arts professionals, government officials responsible for culture, those responsible for implementing cultural policy and others. Skilled leadership and effectively managed policies will benefit artists and cultural entrepreneurs as well as the general public.

The programme was successfully launched with a Southern African regional Train-the-Trainer course at the Goethe-Institut in Johannesburg during May 2012. Fourteen participants representing 10 Southern African countries successfully completed the course.

Call for applications

This call is open for applicants from English-speaking African countries, to participate in the second course offered by the Southern African regional Cultural Leadership Training Hub.

This second course is in Cultural Leadership and Governance and is aimed at high-level leaders within the African creative sector, representing civil society or government or hold positions in the public sector.

This course will cover areas such as global economic and political structures; the history and political economy of Africa; international and African cultural policy instruments; African human development, economic, transparency, democratic, etc indicators; regional, continental and international opportunities and challenges for the African creative sector.

The event, scheduled for Cape Town, South Africa from 6-16 August 2012 will take the form of seminars, lectures, debates, working groups with a high emphasis on participation, encouraging reading and critical thought, and equipping or sharpening participants with the theoretical and other relevant tools to be able to provide intellectual and political leadership within the African creative sector.

The programme is funded by the European Union's Investing in People programme.

Deadline for applications is on Friday, 29 June 2012.

For more, go to www.afai.org.za/projects