Gender Policy for the Armed Forces of Nigeria launched

As a member of the committee set up in June 2020 by the Chief of Defence Staff of the Armed Forces of Nigeria (AFN) to develop its first gender policy, UN Women played a pivotal role in providing technical support and drafting assistance to the committee.

UN Women drafted sections and reviewed the policy document. The Gender Policy provides the strategic framework for prioritizing, implementing, and monitoring gender mainstreaming actions across the three services of the AFN to address the gender disparity within the personnel as well as in its operations. More specifically, the policy outlines specific objectives and actions around formalizing the commitment to gender mainstreaming; strengthening capacities for gender mainstreaming; and integrating gender into training, planning, budgeting, and operations.

The Gender Policy for the Forces was endorsed and officially launched by the on 31 March. The Launch was attended by the Chief of Defence Staff, all Service Chiefs, the Women’s Corps, representatives of Defence Headquarters and other security institutions, and a representative of the Minister of MoWA, Office of the First Lady, and various bilateral and multilateral partners.

The launch served to officially launch the document, sensitize AFN personnel, as well as garner commitments of support for implementation by all stakeholders. UN Women will continue to provide support to the effective roll out of the adopted Policy.