United Nations and other stakeholders have called for gender inclusiveness as a means for women to deal with issues that have a great impact on them.
They made the call at a novelty match between the UN and its development partners to commemorate the sixteen days of activism against gender-based violence in Abuja, Nigeria’s capital.
They also said that the UN takes inclusiveness as a top priority and the key to ensuring delivery and response to women and girls right.
“Violence against women and girls is one of the most prevalent human rights violations in the world, that knows no social, economic or national boundaries. It undermines the health, dignity, security of victims, yet it remains shrouded in a culture of silence”.
To further avert these challenges, a football match between the UN and its development partners was organised to create awareness, further gender equality and women’s empowerment, and also to address the physical and emotional consequences of gender-based violence.
Speaking, the UNDP Gender and Human Right programme analyst and Spotlight project manager, Onyinye Ndubuisi., speaks on how far the sixteen days of activism against gender based violence has been so far.
“This sixteen days have been exciting, because we have been able to to galvanize a solid women movements around the country, ensuring that the footsteps of women, voice of women are heard in commemorating women participatiion in things that have great impact on women and girls in Nigeria. And of course triggering response from government to ensure that women and girls are part of what ever support the Government is giving to the entire population of Nigeria”.
According to Mrs Indubisi, “inclusiveness brings solidarity and that’s why the football game was chosen to create awareness against GBV”.
“I grew up knowing that football brings solidarity, as you can see every one here is so excited. Football brings a lot of solidarity, this has triggered a lot of support from the men as well, so you can see on the pitch, the players are people from different organisations supporting the eradication of all forms of violence against women and girls. This is because of football. We have never galvanize this kind of free movement before., people have volunteered to come out, that means the have passion to use football to create the level of awareness that people are looking for, preach the message for awareness that should try and eradicate GBV in Nigeria. The UN work with what is called gender marker, which means inclusiveness is key and that’s what I do every day, to ensure that gender is a call component of our delivery and that’s what we are able to push for and that’s what are known for”.
The novelty football match that was implemented by FRED, had both women and men team for UN and the Development Partners, respectively.
The UN Women team won against the Development partners with 1-0 while the Development Partners men team won against the UN team. 1-0.
Participating players expressed their excitement over the match, saying the match brought unity, solidarity and a shared common interest.
Nnenna.O
