UN Women: Broader Peace-building Initiative Campaign

The current COVID-19 health emergency is worsening gender inequalities. There is no gainsaying that COVID19 will likely have longer-term gender impacts, pointing to the need to urgently prioritise the best possible response for children, women and the most marginalised. 

The pandemic has deepened pre-existing inequalities, exposing vulnerabilities in social, political, and economic systems. Government’s response to the crisis has failed to adequately integrate gender responsiveness. This can be attributed to low participation of women in the decision-making structures on COVID-19. Women’s voices and needs are inadequately reflected in formal response structures, despite their varying contributions, and not many interventions are working to increase women’s meaningful participation.

Typically, women in Nigeria are grossly underrepresented in decision-making structures, with 4% representation in national parliament, 4.43% in state legislatures and 16.2% of ministerial appointments. Women’s unequal representation puts their specific needs at risk of being overlooked in the development and monitoring of COVID-19 actions, policies, plans and budgets, including for economic recovery and future health resilience. Women’s leadership and participation in decision making in the response to the COVID-19 pandemic is crucial because the impact affects them disproportionately. To amplify women’s leadership and ensure their active participation, there is a need to build cohesion and create visibility around women-led efforts.

Hence, Connected Development (CODE) in collaboration  with UN Women are  implementing  the project on ‘Strengthening State Capacities and Women’s Participation in COVID Response and Broader Peacebuilding Initiatives’. The project seeks to advance women’s meaningful participation in the COVID-19 response and beyond in Kaduna state.

CODE will strengthen women’s capacity and equip them with the necessary tools, skills and expertise to directly participate in COVID19 Response and Broader Peacebuilding Initiatives in Kaduna State. 

Through CODE’s result-oriented advocacy strategy, capacity strengthening strategy, communications expertise and technology resources, we will strengthen women’s capacity and equip them with the necessary tools, skills and expertise to directly participate in COVID19 Response and Broader Peacebuilding Initiatives in Kaduna State.

This project is designed to objectively;

• Strengthen the capacity of women, girls and existing women led advocacy organizations to participate in the development and monitoring of COVID 19 actions, policies, plans and budget including government strategic plan for economic recovery and future health resilience

• To Advocate and amplify women’s leadership and active participation in the decision-making response through effective coalition building and collaboration between women organizations and women in political leadership position