Workshop

Akademi Keadilan’s “Women Leadership in Politics and Value-Based Politics (VBP)"

Last weekend, ARK (Akademi Keadilan) conducted a workshop entitled ‘’Women Leadership in Politics and VBP’’. The workshop was held at Kinabalu Daya Hotel in Kota Kinabalu, Sabah. It was attended by 70 women, who held (or will soon hold) positions in Parti Keadilan Rakyat (PKR) in the state of Sabah.

The workshop began with an Icebreaking session for the participants to get to know each other. During the ice-breaking session, they were asked to make decisions based on questions asked by the facilitator (Ms. Raiyana Abdul). These questions were related to hobbies, politics and leadership. This was followed by an Introduction to Value-Based Politics by Dr Zaliha Mustafa. She explained the concept, it’s meaning and the significance particularly in the context of Malaysia.

The next session was conducted by Ms. Napsiah (together with Dr Zaliha Mustafa), on leadership in the context of campaigning and elections. They explained to the participants the 5Ms in Campaign Management and the role to play depending on whether you are the leader or a follower. They provided the participants with data, to which they gave practical exercises on how to develop strategies based on the data available.

The night session was on ‘’Strategy and Leadership’’ which was presented by Dr. Rahim Ghouse, a mentor at Invoke. In his session, he covered Sun Tzu's Art of War and provided practical tips on how to apply Sun Tzu's lessons. He went through Sun Tzu's best quotes in more detail, and he gave examples from his own experiences of how he applied Sun Tzu's teachings in his political work. He also advised the participants to always think about how to do new things and how to do their work differently.

The next morning, we had a special appearance from the Honorable Fuziah Salleh, Deputy Minister in the Prime Minister's Office (Religious Affairs). During her session, she explained the challenges for leaders, during campaign period or otherwise. She also gave guidance and practical advice to the participants on how they could improve themselves as leaders.

We then had a break for lunch and prayers. This was followed by some teambuilding exercises. After these exercises, we awarded the participants with their certificates. We then concluded the event.