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AFRIHEALTH OPTONET ASSOCIATION |
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Email: afrihealthnigeria@gmail.com Phone: +2348034725905 Website:
www.afrihealthcsos.org |
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National Hq: Suite 216, Block
G, FHA Cornershop, Lugbe, Airport Road, Abuja, Nigeria |
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Civil Society for Elimination of Gender-Based
Violence [CS4EGBV] Project |
A SPEECH PRESENTED
TO THE HONOURABLE MINISTER OF WOMEN AFFAIRS, NIGERIA - HER EXCELLENCY, DAME
PAULINE TALLEN, OFR, KSG; BY THE ‘CEO’/GLOBAL COORDINATOR OF AFRIHEALTH
OPTONET ASSOCIATION – DR. UZODINMA
ADIRIEJE; DURING THE
FORMAL SUBMISSION OF THE COMMUNIQUE FROM THE INTERNATIONAL SYMPOSIUM ON
‘UNDERSTANDING AND ENDING GENDER-BASED VIOLENCE (GBV) IN OUR SOCIETIES’ WHICH
WAS ORGANIZED BY AFRIHEALTH OPTONET ASSOCIATION, ON 14 JANUARY 2021; TODAY, 4
MARCH 2021
Protocols
Thank you for accepting to receive us in audience today to formally submit to you, the communique from the International Symposium on ‘Understanding and Ending Gender-Based Violence (GBV) in Our Societies’ which was organized by Afrihealth Optonet Association on 14 January 2021.
Afrihealth Optonet Association is a community-focused CSOs network/think-tank of about 1000 organizations in the global South for the promotion of Health as a state of complete physical, mental and social well-being; and the SDGs, using partnerships, advocacy, research/evidence-generation, capacity development, outreaches, and monitoring and evaluation (M&E) as strategies; while focusing on rural and poor urban communities, marginalized, vulnerable and disadvantaged populations especially women, children, adolescents and elderly; and exploring the nexus/interlinkages between Health, Energy and Environment – including climate change, biodiversity and ecosystems, Nutrition and Food Security, and Gender, Good Governance and Human Rights. AFRIHEALTH has a Consultative Status at the United Nations ECOSOC
AFRIHEALTH is
currently promoting the Civil Society for Elimination of Gender-Based Violence
(CS4EGBV) Project, 2020-2030. In commemoration of ‘16 Days of Activism’ in 2020, Afrihealth Optonet
Association [CSOs Network] organized a zoom ‘Town Hall Meeting’, the topic of
which was Taming the
Monster: Ending Sexual and Gender-Based Violence Against Women and Girls
(SGVAWG) During and After the COVID-19 Pandemic. On 14 January 2021, AFRIHEALTH organized an
international symposium on ‘Understanding and Ending Gender-Based Violence
(GBV) in our Societies’. On 2 February, AFRIHEALTH organized the International Conference on Cervical
Cancer with the theme: Prevention, Treatment and Mitigation of Cervical
Cancer in Resource constrained Settings during the COVID-19 Pandemic era and
Beyond. Today 4 March 2021,
AFRIHEALTH organized the 2021 International Women’s Day Conference with the
theme: Harnessing and Promoting
Women’s Leadership to Overcome the COVID-19 Pandemic and Achieve the
Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) by 2030; a conference at which Your Excellency
the Honourable Minister delivered the Keynote address, and for which
participants were most grateful.
We hereby humbly submit to your Excellency, the communique from our international conference on ‘Understanding and Ending Gender-Based Violence (GBV) in our Societies’, for your kind attention and submission to the Federal Government, African Union and United Nations.
CIVIL SOCIETY’S ROLES IN THE ELIMINATING ALL FORMS FOR ‘GBV’
We submit for your
kind considerations, the following experience and traditionally informed roles for
AFRIHEALTH Civil Society Network and partners involved eliminating all forms of
GBV; as constituting the roles of the civil society in eliminating all forms of
GBV; for your considerations:
1. To reach out to the wider civil society and
communities to mobilize them for eliminating all forms of GBV using community-focused
activities, and the critical support the governments needs to enable the
country actualize the intentions of eliminating all forms of GBV;
2. Monitoring the implementation of the efforts
and activities for eliminating all forms of GBV;
3. Advocating the integration of the elimination
of all forms of GBV with the National Development Plan(s) in a seamless manner
to avoid unnecessary duplications;
4. Collection and provision of data on all
forms of GBV and support to the Federal Ministry of Women Affairs,
partners/line MDAs and National Bureau of Statistics as may be required;
5. Advocacy for budget and resource
allocation/provision to ensure that efforts at eliminating all forms of GBV are
fully realized;
6. Participate in surveys related to eliminating
all forms of GBV;
7. Provide shadow reports for the Voluntary
National reviews as may be needed from time to time;
8. Bring the elimination of all forms of GBV SDGs
into the political space to ensure that political entities and intending office
holders key into the SDGs-5, 16, 17 and other related SDGs as a matter if
utmost priorities; and
9. Provide effective partnership with other sectors (government, businesses/private for-profit sector, media) and the leadership for the civil society to reach out to the wider communities to achieve the goal of eliminating all forms of GBV.
We request that these roles of the civil society are explicitly provided in Nigeria’s policies and plans for eliminating all forms of GBV.
Afrihealth Optonet Association appreciates the Federal Government’s increasing involvement of the civil society in the effort to end GBV and achieve the SDG-5 in the country. We are particularly grateful to the leadership of the Federal Ministry of Women Affairs for this increased engagement with civil society.
Thank you, Excellency, for your kind attention.
Dr. Uzodinma Adirieje
Civil Society for Elimination of Gender-Based Violence (CS4EGBV) Project
Afrihealth
Optonet Association [CSOs Network]
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