By Justina Auta
Two Non-Government Organisations — Invictus Africa and BudgIT Foundation, on Wednesday, introduced the “Womanity Index”, a tool to track annual ranking and reports on gender equality and Gender-Based Violence (GBV).
The Executive Director of Invictus Africa, Ms. Bukky Shonibare, at a news conference in Abuja, said that the index would also focus on issues affecting women, especially girl-child education, women’s health, economic empowerment, and political representation in Senegal, Ghana, and Nigeria.
She explained that it would be carried out through field and technology-based data collection to assist state and local governments to understand the context and identify gaps, as well as challenges peculiar to each state in addressing GBV.
She said “The Womanity Index is novel as it helps subnational governments, as primary duty bearers, to know their performance in their efforts to prevent and respond to GBV in their states.
“It will also identify the gaps and challenges that impede their performance and the specific actionable recommendations which, when implemented, will result in ensuring laws and policies that guarantee GBV prevention, effective support systems, and allocation of adequate budget and spending to address GBV.
“It will also aid accountability by duty bearers (governments) and provide the relevant data and evidence needed by citizens to track implementation and advocate for effective GBV prevention and response,” she said.
Mr Gabriel Okeowo, the Country Director, of BudgIT Nigeria, said data from the research in some states would serve as reference documents on GBV to ensure state-specific recommendations.
“So this first work is very important and will serve as a baseline.
“We will then have a basis of comparison to be able to say as at 2023 this is where this state is and as at now this is what the results are showing,” he said.
Mr. Folarin Johnson, the Senior Project Officer, Nigeria Governor Forum World Bank SFTAS program, said the index would enable government measure all interventions on GBV in their various states.
According to him, it is a research and it is not just about the field data collection.
“We are going to be building on some of the data that are in existence.
“So the reason this partnership exists is for everybody involved to bring out what they have done in the past and it is what will form the basis of what it is.”
