By Ude Ogbonnaya Israel
Traditional rulers in Bauchi state have pledged their support to champion men to men awarenes to stage fight against gender based violence in their different communities.
The districts heads of Ningi, Miri under Bauchi and Toro Local Government Areas respectively made the commitments during a two days advocacy visits by Male Feminist Network.
Acording to Usmail Umar an advocate project coordinator of the Male Feminist Network in Bauchi the project is being implemented by Ikra Foundation in Bauchi in patnersip with Lawers Alert and African Cntre for Leadership and development to encourage male to take centre stage in protecting women from gender based violence.
Speaking during the vist, the District Head of Ningi Alhaji Yusuf Yunusa Danyaya said they will support the project and even set up a committee that will see the intiative is steppeed down to the remote villages.
He further said that a monitoring committee will be set with target objectivres and deadlines to ensure that they comply and act where complinace is resisted or delayed.
Sharing insights on how they will support the project, he said,
“ At the end of the day, we wll work to make Ningi a reference point to implement this project and we are ready to collaborate with the group,
“We will disseminate this information particularly in the household heads and our community representatives to make sure it yield result,
“I am sure that if thehousehold head (men of the family) are able to understand the program, they will step it down to family, there will be better understanding”, the District Head added.
He lauded the fact that the program viewed their cultural and religious perspective in their concept and expreesed enthusism it will yield result because of such consideration.
On his part the district head of Miri in Bauchi Local Government Area Malam Hussaini Abubakar Othman said they are in full suport of the program because of its noblee intent to solve family problems.
“I will call my subjects to pay attention to this issue”, he said.
In Toro Local Government area, the support was nothing short of encouraging as the District head Alhaji Umar Adamu promised to also engage his subjects for compliance.
“We will try our best to counsel our men especially those in the village to see reason to stop violence aginst women,
“Those who violate it, when we see them, we will bring them here and if it warrants punishing them, we don’t mind”, he said.
The Toro District Head frowned at viloence aginst women by men adding that women are special product to men and violating or abusing them is uncalled for in whatever guise.
He apprciated the intitiators of the project and encouraged them not to be tired in carrying out the project while giving it time to mature and yield result.
Speaking in Toro during the visit, the Director Legal, Lawyers Alert who came from Abuja to spearhead the project in Bauchi said the essence is to engage male network specifically to fight aginst gender based violence.
He argued that over the years, the struggle for the empowerment of women, equality for women and gender equality generally are left for womwn alone and its is only fair or will be more effective to engage men too.
“ By statistics, men have been known to be the main perpetrators of all gender based violence even against women more than it is from the other side to men, then it is high time we engaged men in the struggle to ensure emmpowerment of women”, he said.
He revealed that they will hold a trian a trainer meeting in Bauchi where people in interested in the project will be engaged further to step it down to their respective communities
Bamidele added that they chose to speak to traditional rulers because they are seen as gatekeepers whose voices are respected in the comunities, hence enlisting them to buy the idea will make the project more effective.
Our reportr learnt that the traditional leadrers in the three LGAs visited who promised to support the idea unianimosly underscored the place of fathers in the family as head of the house whose influence is instrumental in achieving the goal.