On Thursday, 28th July, members of the PAWED coalition embarked on an advocacy visit to the Enugu State Ministry of Budget and Planning.
Participating in the advocacy visit were:
- Nkem Awachie (South Saharan)
- Ozor Modesta (AWITA)
- Chinasa Onuoha (FIDAN)
The participants were welcomed into the office of the Commissioner and sat down to have a meeting with the following officials present:
- Hon. Dr. David Ugwunta (Hon. Commissioner for Budget and Planning)
- Bar. Emeka Ngene (HOD Admin and Supply)
- Mrs. Clara Eze (HOD Budget)
- Mrs Okenwa Ndidiamaka (HOD Accounts)
They introduced themselves and the PAWED project. They explained that the advocacy visit came as a follow-up to the recently-concluded policy dialogue session on Women’s Economic Empowerment, which the Commissioner himself had attended.
At the policy dialogue session, several issues surrounding WEE had been discussed, and after deliberations by stakeholders from different sectors, it was decided that the most urgent issue was “low public awareness of existing economic empowerment opportunities“.
The solution to this issue is threefold:
- to create a publicly-accessible online database of current economic empowerment opportunities
- to have a robust awareness campaign (especially through radio) for each economic empowerment opportunity created by the government
- to build the capacity of women in rural areas to be able to apply and partake in avfailable economic empowerment opportunities.
The participants explained that they understood that the Ministry of Budget and Planning was not responsible for creating or implementing projects, but the objective of the advocacy was to:
- appeal to the Ministry that programs and projects that foster WEE in the state be captured and approved in subsequent government budgets
- declare readiness to collaborate with the Ministry where necessary in order to make sure that women have a better business environment as well as support and sponsorship from the state government.
The Honorable Commissioner commended the Coalition’s passion in advocating for Women’s Economic Empowerment.
He noted that the state government was already making great strides towards gender equality, and mentioned several government MDAs headed by women, including the Ministry of Finance, Ministry of Special Duties, the Post Primary Schools Management Board (PPSMB), and the Enugu State Waste Management Authority (ESWAMA).
He also called their attention to ongoing economic empowerment programmes by the government but agreed that indeed there is a need for increasing public awareness of existing economic opportunities. He suggested that the coalition should work with MDAs like the Enugu SME Centre or the Ministry of Information to create a program that would fill this need.
He expressed the willingness of his Ministry to work with the coalition and support advances for WEE.
