FCTA adopts model to end violence against children

The Women Affairs Secretariats of the Federal Capital Territory Administration (FCTA) says it will adopt the pathfinding model to end violence against children across the nation’s capital.

The Mandate Secretary, Adedayo Benjamins-Laniyi, made this known on the side line of the two-day ministerial-level Regional Meeting of the Pathfinding Global Alliance on Ending Violence Against Children in Abuja on Wednesday, May 7, 2025.

The Pathfinding Global Alliance brings together countries and relevant stakeholders committed to accelerating efforts to end all forms of violence against children by 2030, in line with Sustainable Development Goals.

The alliance provides a platform for partners to share information, promising practices, and lessons learned, as well as to collaborate and demonstrate progress.

Benjamins-Laniyi said the FCT Women Affairs Secretariat would establish the FCT Community Network for Ending Violence Against Children.

She added that a multisectoral approach, involving relevant sectors, would be strengthened to function with the full backing of a legal framework, for effective implementation of child protection programmes.

Benjamins-Laniyi said the move was in line with the Nyesom Wike-led FCT Administration’s commitment to providing the needed environment for children to grow, develop, and thrive to their full potential.

She said for the FCT, “everything is a capital project”.

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“So, it is not just road and other capital projects; it is also about women and children – the human capital project of renewed hope in the FCT,” Benjamins-Laniyi stated.

She further described the pathfinding model and tool kit as a model of economy that invests resources into ending violence against children, thereby creating a trajectory for economic prosperity that impacts the GDP.

The mandate secretary added that more emphasis would be placed on the implementation of the Violence Against Persons (Prohibition) Acts, domesticated in the FCT about 10 years ago.

The Special Representative of the UN Secretary-General on Violence Against Children, Dr Najat M’jid, inaugurated a tool kit to end violence against children.

The Senior Economist at Cornerstone Economic Research, Simon Halvey, said the tool kit is entitled, “Building the Investment Case for Ending Violence Against Children Tool Kit”.

Halvey said the purpose of the tool kit was to enable member countries and stakeholders in the child protection space around the world, to develop their own investment cases for ending violence against children.

The Star