Youths to launch `Hands on Harmony' anti-race campaign Fourteen challenges to be taken up Stabroek News July 9, 2000 Rights of the Children (ROC), established by young people with an aim to promote racial harmony will on July 15, launch a new Community Challenge campaign. At a press conference held at the Guyana Human Rights Association office on Hadfield Street yesterday, members of ROC said the aim of the new campaign was to mobilise teams of young people to carry out challenges in their community which would combat racism. The campaign will run from July 15 to September 16, culminating in a national rally in Georgetown. The new campaign, expanding on the `Holding onto Friendships,' campaign will be launched on the lawns of Guyana Stores Ltd under the theme, `Hands on Harmony.' Members of the public will be encouraged to pledge themselves to promote racial harmony by putting their hand prints on a wall. It is expected that the campaign will be conducted in communities all over the country. Teams of young people in communities across Guyana would each take up one of 14 challenges to promote racial harmony. Each team should have between three to ten persons below the age of 23. The challenge chosen would be developed by the team which will inform the regional contact person when it would be done so that judging will take place. Ten outstanding challenges would be chosen for a national rally at the end of the campaign. Challenges include activities such as mounting a display of the origins of the community, which requires members to find out more about where the people in the community came from; the origins of certain kitchen utensils, religious diversity and clothing; composing a multi-ethnic dance with music from at least two cultures in Guyana; street theatre; mural painting; music; poetry and signature activities. Some of the campaigns take the form of competitions while others would be judged for their creativity, originality and impact on the community. Judges will visit communities when the team has completed its challenge, or is performing. ROC was established in 1998 after a series of advocacy training programmes with young people. Their campaign is supported by the Canada Peace-Building Fund. Follow the goings-on in Guyana in Guyana Today