Foundation holds town hall meeting on gender equitable norms
Sultan Foundation for Peace and Development (SFPD), an NGO, on Tuesday engaged community based groups to strengthen its advocacy skills on promoting gender equitable norms in Sokoto State.
The Foundation’s Programme Officer, Alhaji Musa Galadanci, said the exercise was continuation of the series aimed at incalcating proper messaging skills and encouraging selected men and women to educate people on gender equitable norms.
Galadanci explained that the NGO, with support from EU-UN Spotlight Initiative Project, embarked on capacity building to prevent all forms of Violence Against Women and Girls (VAWG), Sexual and Gender Based Violence (SGBV) and other Harmful Practices (HP).
He noted that participants were drawn from Manufarmu Al-Ummarmu and Mata Uwayenmu community groups based in Sokoto North Local Government Area of the state.
” In this town hall meeting we are here to rub minds, to solve the problems and challenges facing gender issues and strengthen gender equitable norms, ” Galadanci said.
He said the exercise was to encourage best practices in recognition of values for both boys and girls and enhance the fight against the GBV occurrences and other detrimental practices.
The programme officer added that the gathering served as opportunity for participants to share thoughts on gender equitable norms, measures to reduce violence against women and girls, drawing insights from their various communities in relation to happenings.
He emphasised the need for men to understand SGBV, Female Genital Mutilation (FGM) and Violence Against Persons Prohibition (VAAP) Law, in relation to daily livings, stressing that poor understanding, culture and compromise were challenges in tackling the menace in communities.
The Resource Person, Dr Mansur Isa-Buhari, from Usmanu Danfodio University Sokoto, educated the groups on categories of GBV, prevalence, consequences, policies and laws, as well as referral pathways.
Isa-Buhari dwelled on the challenges of discriminatory behaviours against the female gender in social norms and actions detrimental to women and girls, especially on domestic duties and educational pursuits.
He said it was necessary to educate people, especially men who are husbands and custodians, on best ways on gender equitable norms and ways to handle GBV cases, support survivors and eliminate violence against women and girls.
He cautioned participants against all forms of psychological, emotional, physical and sexual abuse of women and girls, stressing that poor language of communication subjected women to different traumatic unrest.
Some participants, Ahmad Muhammadu, Ilyasu Nasiru, Zainab Umar, Usman Yahaya and Hassana Bello, thanked Sultan Foundation for the opportunity and described the exercise as impactful.
Participants stressed the need for more people to be engaged in recognition of widespread cases of GBV, sexual abuses, domestic violence and other abuse detrimental to women and girls as well as boys progress.
The News Men reports that the exercise featured questions and answers, as well as experience-sharing among participants and facilitators.
