UNFPA Representative Mr. Alain Sibenaler paid a courtesy call on the Hon. Minister of Gender Labour and Social Development, Hon. Frank Tumwebaze on February 18 2020.  The meeting was witnessed by the Commissioner Gender and Women Affairs and her technical team. The UNFPA Representative was also accompanied by Assistant Representative Dr. Edson Muhwezi and a technical team.    

UNFPA is one of the UN agencies supporting the Government of Uganda through Ministry of Gender Labour and Social Development to fulfill its mandate on Gender Equality and Women’s Empowerment. Mr Sibenaler presented UNFPA’s three  global goals; Ending Preventable Maternal Death; Ending unmet need for family Planning; and Ending Gender –Based Violence and Harmful Practices, which is well aligned to the mandate of the  Ministry of Gender, Labor and Social Development Mandate. Gender equality interventions are not implemented in isolation, but through an integrated approach to deliver the package of rights to women and girls.  

UNFPA has mobilized substantive amounts of resources to support Gender Based Violence interventions in Uganda through specific time bound programmes including:

• The UNFPA/UN Women Joint Programme on Gender Based Violence integrating Sexual Reproductive Health and Rights
• UN Joint Programme on Female Genital Mutilation
• EU Spotlight Initiative to Eliminate Violence Against Women and Girls 
• The Global Joint Programme to End Child Marriage 
• Support to address Uganda’s population challenge and improve family planning uptake
• Women Adolescents and Youth Programme 
• Delivering an Integrated Rights Package to the last Mile Programme

UNFPA has also received funding from the Netherlands government and the Ministry of Gender, Labour and Social Development is among the implementing partners.  Other implementing partners include the 12 district Local Governments in West Nile and Acholi sub-region including; Arua, Yumbe, Koboko, Adjumani, Moyo and Lamwo,  Zombo, Nebbi, Maracha, Pakwach, Amuru and Agago.

Mr Sibenaler concluded by congratulating the Honourable Minister on his new appointment by the President to head the Ministry of Gender Labour and Social Development.

In his remarks, Hon. Frank Tumwebaze, appreciated UNFPA for the longtime collaboration and partnership with the Ministry, and expressed his excitement about UNFPA’s mandate especially for the transformative Goal 3: “Ending Gender –Based Violence and Harmful Practices”.

He called for a renewed approach as a country to address Gender Based Violence by targeting the community gatekeepers including; the Police, Probation officers, Community Development officers, Local leaders and the Administrator General’s Office, who always witness GBV survivors and leave them unattended to. He retaliated the need to know and engage the GBV actors at all levels, get to know the sources of GBV right from the grassroots and devise sustainable means of GBV prevention and mitigation.

The Minister committed to mobilize all UN agencies and government stakeholders/GBV actors including DPP, Judiciary, Ministry of Local Government, CSOs, RDCs, local leaders, Chief administrative Officers, Media, Office of the Presidency and all frontline GBV actors for a deliberate meeting to quickly dialogue on ways of addressing GBV right from the household level. This will involve capacity building and empowering the different actors and strengthening legislation against GBV, including review of existing laws to address the gaps which undermine implementation.  He stressed that perpetuators and other duty bearers who do not pay due diligence to their mandate should face consequences of their acts.

The Hon. Minister concluded by retaliating the Ministry’s commitment to provide support to ensure conducive environment to the partners, and this calls for:

• A breakfast GBV policy Dialogue meeting- planned for early April immediately after the IWD when the spotlight initiative will be launched and the Commission on the Status of Women conference taking place in New York in March 2020. This will be coordinated by Ministry of Gender, Labour and Social Development in collaboration with UNFPA.