Civil society celebrates 30th anniversary |11 November 2019
HC Suhag and Mr Fred after unveiling the plaque to mark the official launch of the Ceps House project (Photo: Louis Toussaint)
Ceps House project launched
The Citizens Engagement Platform Seychelles (Ceps) on Saturday celebrated 30 years of existence as the civil society platform – 25 years as Lungos (Liaison Unit for Non-governmental Organisations) and 5 years as Ceps.
To mark this milestone, the Ceps House project was launched at Ile du Port followed by a small celebration at its current headquarters at Orion Mall in the presence of the Indian high commissioner General Dalbir Singh Suhag and other members of Ceps.
“With the launch of the Ceps House project, we will be able to start looking for funds. This building will facilitate our members in their work and cut the cost of renting. This will also benefit our citizens by having some specific services in the building. Currently we are still in the planning stage and the cost of the project will be between R23 and R26 millions. The building will consist of ground floor plus three levels. The land is a lease from the government that was allocated to Lungos and transferred to Ceps. We hope by the end of the year, the plan will be submitted to Planning and construction will start in one year’s time,” explained Ceps’ board chairman Jude Fred.
This land was allocated to the civil society platform in 2007 and when asked why the project took so long and why now, Mr Fred answered: “I do not know why the project took so long to materialise, but with the current board and also from the previous board, we started talking about it and I think everything has its own time. With the amount of work that our platform has, we feel that now is the time to have our own building. Our members also kept stressing on the fact that we need to become more independent. We then pushed for the project to start and thanks to Architect Brian Changty-Seng, we now have a plan in hand. We hope in the next two years we see something in place for our civil society.”
Talking about the 30th anniversary, Michel Pierre, Ceps’ chief executive, said that Lungos came into existence in 1989. “It was set up to coordinate the activities of NGOs in Seychelles and its purpose was to promote, encourage and coordinate relief, welfare, and development of activities of all NGOs in Seychelles without prejudice to the autonomy of its individual members. After 25 years of existence, Lungos held its last AGM on November 8, 2014 thus giving birth to Ceps, the new platform for civil society in Seychelles. The then Seychelles Institute of Management (SIM) was contracted to help transform Lungos into Ceps. We have had five years of hard work and became a stronger voice. We are sitting with the government and discussing pertinent issues regarding civil society sector and other issues affecting the environment, health, gender related issues among others. We have also now joined the civil society platform on the regional and continental levels. Over the years we have organised various training and we will continue to do so. During these 30 years, there are so many people who have helped us and we say thank you to all of them.”
During both events, High Commissioner Suhag suggested to Ceps that “as it is a government aided organisation, the Government/Ceps can submit a proposal for aid up to R7 million for the new Ceps House as the government of India aids only government projects or government supported projects that will benefit the community”.
Currently 104 organisations are accredited to Ceps. There are some non-governmental organisations that are very active and some of them not really present. Ceps’ role is to assist and scrutinize all these NGOs and help them to operate properly.
For its 30th anniversary Ceps also launched a booklet with a brief outlook on the history and impact of volunteerism in Seychelles from the standpoint of civil society and some members – Marie-Nella Azemia, Agnielle Payet and Michel Pierre – were awarded for their services.
Vidya Gappy
