Invictus Africa, BudgIT to rank states by gender-based violence

• index to provide a baseline for homegrown data per state

An advocacy group on gender equality, Invictus Africa, is in partnership with BudgIT Foundation to release a ‘womanity index’ report and ranking on the state of gender-based violence for each state in Nigeria and the FCT.

The collaboration which has received the support of the Ford Foundation will assess the commitment of state governments towards GBV prevention and response using 20 indicators from five indexes.

The indexes are, “Laws and policies, access to legal justice, support systems, information and awareness, and budget allocations and spending”.

The group said the methodology was an improvement from generalized data which did not address the uniqueness of various states as “Some states perform well in certain areas like laws while doing poorly in giving support to victims.”

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According to Invictus Africa, the targeted approach adopted would help to identify these contexts, gaps and challenges and proffer actionable recommendations tailored to the states.

“The fact that two states are close in proximity does not mean they have the same gender-based issues. We don’t want to build systems based on assumptions or blanket statements. So there will be a distinction between Ogun state and Lagos, for instance”, it noted.

Addressing journalists at the press conference, Bukky Shonibare, Executive Director, Invictus Africa, said that while the “Womanity index is based on five key issues affecting women and girls, namely gender-based violence, women’s health, girl-child education, women economic empowerment and women political representation and is being produced in partnership with BudgIT Foundation with support from Ford Foundation to cover three countries in West Africa- Nigeria, Ghana, and Senegal”, the Womanity index would beam its light on gender-based violence.

Shonibare also revealed that the “Index will adopt qualitative and quantitative approaches through field and technology-based data collection, surveys, key informant interviews, desk research and expert contributions.

“Following the release of the womanity index, a memorandum of understanding will be signed with some states while providing technical support to them as they implement their state specific recommendations”.

Also, program officer for gender, racial and ethnic justice at Ford West Africa office, Olufunke Baruwa, noted that “GBV requires a multi-sectional approach and as such governments at all levels need to take the lead in driving efforts to address it. The womanity index therefore helps provide the baseline for that to happen effectively and efficiently”.

“The womanity index will aid accountability by duty bearers and provide the relevant data and evidence needed by citizens to track implementation and advocate for effective GBV prevention and response”, she emphasized.

The data, the foundation said, would be gathered through state research consultants with a proven track record in gender-based issues.

Fielding questions from journalists, Bukky said the organization was not only going to gather data but look at the humanitarian angles to the problem.

She said, “Not only research and data, we want to put a human face to the data reported”.

She noted that the Covid-19 pandemic created a shadow pandemic revealing deep-seated existing gender-based violence issues adding, “There is a lot to be done. We will assess the impact of what has been done earlier to provide a baseline. We want to put data as evidence”.

On when the report will be ready, she disclosed that “By last quarter our report for Nigeria will be ready and we will come back to access it to monitor progress and improvement”.

She further revealed that the program had received acceptance and validation from the government.

According to her, there had been a validation session and workshop with representatives of the Ministry of Women Affairs, Nigeria’s Governors’ Forum and the Nigeria Governor’s Wives’ Forum.