MBNCWD seeks partners to implement four-year women’s development plan – News Agency of Nigeria

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Partners
By Hafsah Tilde
Abuja, Oct. 27, 2026 (NAN) The Maryam Babangida National Centre for Women Development (MBNCWD) has called for stronger partnerships to implement its proposed four-year women’s development plan, focusing on institutional capacity, economic empowerment and measurable outcomes.
The Director-General of the centre, Dr Adedayo Benjamins-Laniyi, made the call at a meeting with development partners in Abuja on Tuesday, where stakeholders reviewed the draft strategic framework.
She described the centre as a key link between national gender policies and their implementation in communities, emphasising its role in translating government commitments into practical interventions.
“For us, therefore, the Women’s centre is the pivot. It’s the implementation pipeline of the Federal Ministry of Women Affairs, of the presidential and national agenda of the gender implementation programmes,
“within the National Action Programme, within Peace and Security, within health, cross-cutting every sector of national reform and intervention.
“So it’s not just about women development, because when you invest in development for women, you end up investing in development for community, for family,” she said.
Benjamins-Laniyi said a major challenge was the lack of reliable, evidence-based data to determine who existing policies and programmes reached and where interventions were most needed.
“This is because a big gap has been no information, no evidence-backed data. You understand, you want to make these changes. Who are we making changes for? Where? You know, all of this is critical,” she said.
She said the centre was developing a proposed gender data bank and exploring ways to track intervention outcomes and strengthen evidence-based planning and decision-making.
The proposed framework is organised around eight pillars under the acronym RENOVATE: Rebuild, Empower, Nurture, Optimise, Value-driven, Amplify, Transform and Evaluate.
The pillars cover institutional capacity, women’s economic empowerment, leadership development, partnerships, accountability, communication, vocational training and programme evaluation.
The director-general said the centre also planned to strengthen technology use by digitising administrative processes, human resource management, training programmes and the Nigerian Women’s Hall of Fame.
She said the centre had begun information and communication technology training for its 262 staff members within her first four months in office.
On disability inclusion, Benjamins-Laniyi said the centre was working to improve physical accessibility, institutional arrangements and access to enabling technology.
She emphasised the need to involve persons with disabilities in decisions affecting them.
“Nothing about them without them,” she said.
The director-general also called for support to modernise vocational training to meet labour-market needs, improve women’s access to finance and extend programmes beyond Abuja through the centre’s six zonal offices.
“We need the partnerships. We need the friends. We need the funds,” she said.
Speaking at the meeting, Adedayo Adejokun, Group Head, Federal Government Business and Partnerships at eTranzact International Plc, said technology could help the centre expand its reach and track participants’ progress.
She urged the centre to ensure that the proposed gender data bank went beyond information collection to monitor beneficiaries’ progress through different interventions.
“Is it just a data collation point? Or an operational framework that will be useful for tracking how people progress through interventions and initiatives?” she asked.
Adejokun said eTranzact was willing to contribute technical expertise and explore areas of collaboration with the centre.
“We will be very happy to contribute not just as partners in terms of funding, but also expertise,” she said.
Peju Lawanson, Head of Business Development at the National Credit Guarantee Company (NCGC), highlighted the importance of credit guarantees in improving women’s access to finance and supporting their businesses.
Farida Usman, Associate Programme Officer at the Women’s Rights Advancement and Protection Alternative (WRAPA), urged the centre to strengthen its presentation of the proposed strategy, clarify priorities and identify areas of interest for prospective partners.
Benjamins-Laniyi said the framework remained a draft, adding that further details, including expected impacts and monitoring and evaluation measures, would be shared to guide partners’ contributions.
NAN reports that the meeting had in attendance representatives of UN Women, NCGC, UNFPA, GIZ, the African Development Bank (AfDB), ActionAid, International IDEA, WRAPA and other organisations.(NAN)
TIL/AMM
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Edited by Abiemwense Moru