NAN-H-70
Empowerment
By Lizzy Okoji
Abuja, March 27, 2017 (NAN) Hajiya Sadia Umar-Farouk, Federal Commissioner, National Commission for Refugees, Migrant and Internally Displaced Persons (NCFRMI), has appealed to ECOWAS to support NCFRMI in empowering displaced women.
Umar-Farouk made the appeal during a visit to the office of the ECOWAS Commissioner for Social Service and Gender, Dr Fatimata Dia Sow, on Monday in Abuja.
According to her, women and children are the most vulnerable during conflicts and tackling the horrible effects of the insurgency on them was a priority on the commission’s agenda.
Umar-Farouk called on the ECOWAS Commission to support the NCFRMI activities, especially those concerning women and children and also include them in ECOWAS empowerment and protection programmes.
“The commission is keen on working with ECOWAS, stakeholders and civil societies to explore ways of empowering women and for them to be turned to positive agents of change and peace.
“We need your cooperation in their economic empowerment, social empowerment, their special care and psychological support.
“We need to partner to ensure that economically, these women are empowered through grants for agriculture and other value chain initiatives so that they can be self-sufficient.
“In the areas of special care and psycho-social support, we aim to incorporate the special needs of women, persons living with disabilities, trauma and other situations into special programmes to help them overcome them.
“Women as mothers are the first educators and must be given the means to make their contributions and impact on their children in order to boost peace building in the society,’’ Umar Farouk.
Umar-Farouk called for the inclusion of displaced women and girls in the ECOWAS programme on Business Incubators for West African Women Entrepreneurs (BIWE).
She called on the ECOWAS commission to support the NCFRMI in its push for the domestication of the Kampala Convention with special emphasis on its provision to promote economic empowerment of women, protection from Sexual and Gender Based Violence and psycho-social support.
The federal commissioner said the commission also looked forward to signing a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with the ECOWAS commission to confirm its commitments for collaboration.
Responding, Dia Sow said the ECOWAS commission remained committed to supporting Nigeria in various programmes aimed at ameliorating the situation as it concerned the victims of insurgency and other conflicts in Nigeria.
According to her, the problem at hand is not just a burden for Nigeria but a concern for ECOWAS as region.
She said ECOWAS commission had been engaged in series of activities and programmes to alleviate the sufferings of the IDPs in Nigeria.
Dia Sow said that the ECOWAS commission will take into account all the issues from the Commission and scale up its intervention and support.
She said that the ECOWAS commission would strengthen its collaboration with national institutions like the NCFRMI and the National Emergency Management Agency (NEMA) to have more visible action on the field.
She said the ECOWAS humanitarian and gender department had developed a policy and framework of action on strategic plans gender equality for sustainable development.
Dia Sow explained that recently, the commission had done some operational implementation of the policy in Nigeria by giving scholarship to school girls who had little or no access to education.
She said that the displaced girls would also be captured as beneficiaries of the scholarship.
She said later in the year, the ECOWAS commission also planned to organise a forum on empowering women in agriculture and processing which would be held in Nigeria.
Dia Sow said that her department would make specific proposal for Nigeria to be captured in its next year’s budget to facilitate several activities for displaced women. (NAN)
LIZ/MO/AFA
Edited by Morayo Omolade/Felix Ajide