By Busayo Obisakin | Project Leader
Gender-Based Violence remains a pervasive global issue, affecting millions of individuals yearly. Addressing this problem involves not only prevention but also ensuring justice and support for survivors. Over these last few months, Women inspiration development Center (WIDC) have intensified our effort in making community leaders accountable, strengthen legal frameworks, improve support services, and enhance the prosecution of GBV cases.
From our observations in the last six months, reporting of gender-based violence cases have reduced drastically. In the past, reporting cases in our office ranges from 4 to 6 weekly but in the last six month, it has reduced to 2 to 3 cases weekly and we have been noticing these trends.
WHAT WE HAVE BEEN DOING DIFFERENTLY IN THE LAST SIX MONTHS
As a result of the shelter, we acquired through the support we got from one of the GlobalGiving corporate partners, our support system has been strengthening and improved. We have been able to remove survivors away from their places of abuse until their cases are resolved, these gave more survivors confidence to report their cases since they were always afraid of backlash from their abusers if they report and still within the reach of the abusers.
Our Community Response Team (CRT) was trained as para-legal to handle cases to a certain level which makes processing of justice easier for people in the villages that are far away from civilization.Increased awareness campaigns, confidential reporting channels, and community-based support systems have encouraged survivors to report incidents, leading to a more accurate representation of the scale of the issue.
We have also improved other support services like counselling, healthcare, and legal aid and these services have empowered survivors to seek justice without fear of retribution and have aided in their recovery process. However, continued efforts are still necessary to sustain this positive trend and address the root causes of Gender Based Violence.
WAY FORWARD
We need to ensure continued funding for programs supporting survivors and initiatives aimed at preventing Gender Based Violence. Continuous promotion of education and awareness campaigns to challenge harmful stereotypes and culture of respect and equality is germane.
We have to enhance collaboration between government agencies, NGOs, law enforcement, and community stakeholders to provide comprehensive support for survivors and prevent future cases. We started process on this this week as WIDC facilitated meeting between 15 NGOs and First Lady of our state to discuss strategies to reduce gender-Based Violence in the state to a minimal level.
In conclusion, reduction in GBV cases is a promising outcome of increased justice for survivors. Continued dedication to supporting survivors and addressing the societal factors contributing to GBV is essential in ensuring a sustained decline in these incidents. We appreciate all our funders at GlobalGiving for these achievements and we hope in the coming year, you will continue to partner with us and more supports will come our way for us to continue to serve our communities and nation Nigeria until we rid it of inequalities and violence against women and girls
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