FOMWAN trains advocates to tackle health gaps

The Federation of Muslim Women’s Associations of Nigeria (FOMWAN) has trained representatives of faith-based organisations and women’s groups to shore up campaigns that will help them hold stakeholders to account in how they deliver healthcare to women and children. Some 40 representatives were drawn from six states—Bauchi, Kano, Kaduna, Nasarawa, Niger, Oyo and the FCT—where […]

The Federation of Muslim Women’s Associations of Nigeria (FOMWAN) has trained representatives of faith-based organisations and women’s groups to shore up campaigns that will help them hold stakeholders to account in how they deliver healthcare to women and children.

Some 40 representatives were drawn from six states—Bauchi, Kano, Kaduna, Nasarawa, Niger, Oyo and the FCT—where FOMWAN works with the project Partnership for Advocacy in Child and Family Health (PACFaH) to mobilise communities.

FOMWAN’s programme officer, Adama Musa Kachalla, said the training in Abuja was to boost their capacity and competencies and strengthen their skills to train others to advocate for the four core areas of routine immunisation, family planning, nutrition and attention to childhood killer diseases.

“We sensitise them initially on PACFaH areas of interest, and with their help in various states, we have been getting feedback,” said Kachalla.

One participant, Mark Asu-Obi, director of Justice, Development and Peace/Caritas Advocats (JDPCA) in Kano, said the core areas of health for women and children suffered from low implementation and attention.

“The collaboration is to see how government can be engaged to see attention drawn to issues related to child health, nutrition, women and family planning,” Asu-Obi told Daily Trust.

He said advocates expected engagement will produce better planning and decision making, adding, “high level processes of engagement will make a lot of impact in this respect.”

“That is a core component of what PACFaH is geared toward doing—to engage to see budgetary allocations are made, and they are made to reach the target groups that need to benefit.”

Beyond that, he said, implementation must be “efficient and effective.”