STRENGTHENING LOCAL ADVOCACY FOR DISABILITY INCLUSIVE ELECTORAL PROCESSES (SLADIEP)
BRIEF PROJECT DESCRIPTION:
The Project, "Strengthening Local Advocacy for Disability Inclusive Electoral Processes (SLADIEP)" is funded by Irish Aid and is being implemented in Makurdi Local Government Area of Benue State. The project seeks to promote Disability inclusiveness in Electoral Processes for increased civic participation of Persons with Disabilities (PWD) by 2023. Through the project, dialogues and forums will be held on disability-inclusive governance in Makurdi LGA. The empathy will inform advocacy demands for mainstreaming of disability needs in political party’s manifestos which will be carried out to leaders of political parties, stakeholders, and electoral institutions.
The advocacy will be informed by empathy from the dialogues and forums which will significantly improve the targeting of PWDs by political parties during manifestos and rallies with key information and messages which will enhance their participation in electoral processes. The project will also support PWDs to participate in electoral processes through capacity strengthening on electoral legal frameworks which recognize their rights to participate in electoral processes based on equality in the political, public, and social life, therefore promoting disability-inclusive electoral processes. The project will also leverage the framework on access and participation of persons with disability to strengthen the capacity of leaders of political parties on DIEPs to enhance mainstreaming of disability needs and improve participation of PWDs in electoral processes.
Through the Project activities, FJDP seeks to; Have a Stakeholders mapping which will be followed by a stakeholder entry meeting, disability Civic Needs Assessment which will be carried out in a form of a Knowledge Attitude and Practice (KAP) Survey, dialogues/forums which will be held in the form of a round table with stakeholders, sensitization, capacity building trainings and advocacy.
The project which is to last for six months commenced in July, 2022 and is being implemented by FJDP under the supervision of Arish Aid. So far, FJDP has been able to carry out Stakeholders mapping on the importance and influence of each of them, Stakeholders inception meeting where the project was introduced to the stakeholders to share in the burden of Mainstreaming Disability Civic needs Participation in Electoral Process and Disability Civic needs assessment carried out using KoboCollect tool across the eleven Council wards of Makurdi LGA through the KAP survey. The survey reached out to 200 respondents.
The project is relevant to “a better world” Ireland’s International development policy since it will strengthen the voice of local communities to influence policy decisions that impact them and realization of the rights of PWDs in line with international instruments to which Nigeria is a signatory and the Nigerian electoral legal framework which recognizes the right of persons with disability to participate, based on equality in the political, public and social life of the country, therefore promoting disability-inclusive electoral processes.
Thus, the expected outcome of the project is to promote Disability inclusiveness in Electoral Processes for increased civic participation of persons with Disabilities by 2023.
