NILDS pledges support for state houses of assembly on women inclusiveness
The National Institute for Legislative and Democratic Studies (NILDS) has pledged to provide technical support for State Houses of Assembly for the implementation of State Action Plan (SAP) on inclusiveness of women in peace building.
The Director-General of the institute, Prof. Abubakar Sulaiman said this at a workshop titled, “SAP on Women, Peace and Security” on Monday in Abuja.
The workshop was organised by NILDS in collaboration with UN Women and Norwegian Embassy for members and staff of Adamawa, Bauchi, Borno, Kaduna and Yobe State Houses of Assembly.
The Voice Media Trust (VMT NEWS) reports that the United Nations Security Council passed a resolution in 2000 commonly referred to as UNSCR 1325 on women,peace and security.
By this resolution, there was a concerted call for women to participate fully in peace-building and peace-making processes, be involved in post-conflict recovery and peace negotiations, be protected from human rights violations, and have access to justice.
This required that countries come up with National Action Plans (NAPs) on women, peace and security that reflected commitment and accountability toward the security of women and girls during armed conflicts, while ensuring their participation in peace processes.
Nigeria launched NAP in 2013 and 16 out of the 36 states of the federation has so far, domesticated the policy known as SAP.
Sulaiman, represented by the Director, Legal Services, Dr Shaibu Danwaka, reminded the lawmakers that the SAP would not be fully executed without legislative input and oversight.
“Rest assured that NILDS, in collaboration with UN Women, will continue to provide any technical support necessary for State Houses of Assembly to own the SAPs, while ensuring the protection and welfare of women and girls in Nigeria through relevant institutional mechanisms and processes,” he said
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The Deputy Country Rep of UN Women, Mr Lansana Woneh said that the workshop was aimed at bringing lawmakers together to understand the SAP and solicited their support for its implementation.
“We recognise that your role as lawmakers is critical to the implementation of SAP because until you make relevant laws that along with the plan and until you perform the relevant oversight in terms of budget allocation, the plans cannot be implemented.
“The fact is, you do not support the implementation of the SAP, they can never be implemented.
“States and Nigeria can only achieve full development when there is peace; and peace is only durable when it is inclusive.
“In all peace building around the world, it is only when peace building process includes full participation of women that durable peace was realised,” Woneh said.
She said that if women were not engaged in peace building process, it would be unfair and their valuable skills of women would be missed.
In an interview with newsmen, the Deputy Speaker of Yobe House of Assembly, Mr Yau Dachia said that the state government was working to ensure the attainment of the aims and objective of SAP.
“The objectives are being achieved as the state is recovering from the effects of Boko Haram insurgency,” he said.
He said that the SAP initiative was important because there was need for the people to come together to address the challenges.
Dachia said that unless the traditional, cultural and religious biases against women were addressed, SAP would not be effectively implemented
He said that as new assembly, they would support the SAP initiative and legislative where necessary to alleviate and end the problems faced by women and girls.
Also, the Majority Leader in the Yola House of Assembly, Mrs Kate Mamuno called for quick intervention of the crisis in Niger Republic
“Honestly, we have to ensure that the conflict is tackled with all sense of responsibility; in fact, it has started affecting women and children.
“In every conflict or crisis, women and children are at receiving end; I pray that the government will do the needful to curtails or minimise that hardship women and children are facing right now in Niger.
“We thank God because Nigeria is the Chairman of the ECOWAS, we pray that the ECOWAS nations will step in to ensure the find a final resolution to that crisis,” she said.
