First-time Legislators Receive Training

August 19, 2004

Indonesia’s April 2004 general elections ushered in a large number of first-time legislators, including women. Many of those elected were trained by IRI. In six of seven provinces where IRI conducts programs, over 30 percent of the elected local legislators received campaign training from IRI prior to the election.

To help newly-elected legislators learn about their roles and responsibilities, IRI organized a post-election review conference and a series of 15 training sessions. IRI will send four U.S. experts to conduct the governance training: State Representative Leslie Waters (Florida); State Senator Mick Mines (Nebraska); State Representative Kevin DelGobbo (Connecticut); former State Representative Glenn Scott (Colorado). The training sessions began in late July and will continue through mid-September. In addition to the general training, IRI is conducting joint training sessions for legislators with Internews, a nongovernmental organization that promotes open media throughout the world. The joint-training focuses on media relations and political media strategy.

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