National Consultant for Development of Guidelines on Safety of Women Human Rights Defenders’ Network

Contract

This is a National Consultant contract. More about National Consultant contracts.

Background

UN Women is part of the UN Agencies that are implementing the European Union-United Nations global, multi-year Spotlight initiative that focuses on eliminating all forms of violence against women and girls, harmful practices and promotion of sexual and reproductive health rights. The initiative is being implemented in partnership with the Government of Uganda, Non-Governmental Organizations, and Civil Society Organizations in 7 districts of Uganda including Tororo, Kasese, Kitgum Amudat, Arua, Kyenjojo and Kampala.

The overall aim of Spotlight Initiative is to achieve gender equality and women’s empowerment, in line with the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development. It aims to address gender inequality and violence against women and girls (VAWG), including sexual and gender based violence (SGBV) and harmful practices (HP) of child marriage and female genital mutilation (FGM) and to promote sexual and reproductive health and rights (SRHR) working closely with civil society, the private sector, religious and cultural leaders, and academia. Pillar 6 of the Spotlight Initiative which UN Women leads, aims to create a strong, vibrant, inclusive and active women’s movement in Uganda which engages on a wider range of issues and with non-traditional groups, reaches from national to local levels, and is held together by a shared set of core values, rather than a single issue or advocacy initiative. The vision is to see ‘an inclusive and strengthened women’s movement [constituted of women’s rights groups, autonomous social movements, advocates, civil society organizations, including those representing youth and groups facing multiple and intersecting forms of discrimination/marginalization, religious and cultural leaders, the private sector and other stakeholders] more effectively influence and advance progress on GEWE and VAWG, including SGBV/HP.

One of Pillar 6 strategic partners is the Women Human Rights Defenders (WHRDs) Network Uganda. The Initiative recognizes that there has been a backlash against champions of women’s rights who stand up and speak out in favor of women, this includes women in power and activists alike. The programme therefore seeks to protect the rights of these women and ensure they are able to speak out without jeopardizing their own safety. It a network of women that are active in human rights defense and often being targeted by security operatives or other actors for who they are— because they are women as well as for what they do—because of their work of defending human rights. For example, laws such as the Public Order Management Act, (POMA) 2013 create restrictive environment in addition to patriarchal norms, and all these tend to restrict freedoms of WHRDs to do their human rights work. WHRDs are also exposed to different forms of violence and attacks because of who they are and the work they do in the field of human rights. They experience use gender-based verbal abuse based on their sex, the use of gender and sexual stereotypes to harm

WHRDS’s reputation, their image and also delegitimize their work. Even the use of digital technology and techniques has exposed them to new technology related forms of violence and WHRDs are confronted with surveillance and censorship. Additionally, these new spaces have also not been spared by the government which has imposed laws to govern online spaces such as the Computer Misuse Act.

It is against this background that UN Women and WHRDNs is launching a call for a consultant to support enhancement of the safety and protection of WHRDs integrating elaboration of guidelines applicable to offline and online contexts.

Duties and Responsibilities

Under the guidance of OHCHR Team leader of Kampala Monitoring Team and WHRDN-U Executive Director, the Consultant will undertake the following tasks :

1. Propose a comprehensive, inclusive and participatory working methodology, integrating the overall process of carrying out the work and a chronogram of activities;
2. Collect relevant information on the threats, risks associated with gender attacks and gendered consequences, off line and online safety needs and solutions to dealing with online and offline violations.
3. Participate in the capacity building activities in the 3 regions namely; Busoga, Rwenzori and Karamojong in order to interact with WHRDs.
4. Develop a draft version of a user friendly online and offline safety guideline, including a checklist of practical tips on offline and online safety measures as part of the guideline
5. Facilitate the national validation of the guidelines and integrate feedback in the final version.
6. The Final Online and Safety Guideline must:
   • Provide a feminist lens integrating a gender perspective

• Explain the usefulness of the guidelines in dealing with threats, risks, attacks which is important in Human Rights work of WHRDs
• Be written in an interactive, inspiring, simple user-friendly format, with use of illustrations, graphics and visual images to encourage reflections, learnings, dialogue and easy-to-carry for WHRDs
• Where possible give practical examples, cases, stories that demonstrate how to prevent and respond to offline and on-line attacks against WHRDs

Competencies

Corporate Competencies

• Demonstrates integrity by modelling the UN's values and ethical standards;
• Promotes the vision, mission, and strategic goals of the UN, particularly relating to gender equality and the empowerment of women;
• Displays cultural, gender, religion, sexual orientation, race, nationality and age sensitivity and adaptability;
• Treats all people fairly and without favouritism.

Functional Competencies

• Possess excellent team spirit and be able to work in a multi-cultural environment;
• Demonstrate open-mindedness, objectivity and impartiality in all circumstances;
• Demonstrate knowledge of key principles of confidentiality, dignity of WHRDs, do-no- harm in the course of carrying out the assignment activities.

Required Skills and Experience

Education

• Minimum of Master’s degree in related fields including Mass communication, Gender and Women Studies, Computer Science, Information Technology, Development Studies, Social Sciences, computer sciences or other related discipline

Experience

• A minimum of 7 years of proven and substantive experience in designing and developing handbooks, manuals on online or offline in relation to protection of HRDs generally.
• At least 3 years’ experience in the field of Human rights, Women’s rights, preferably in the context of Human Rights Defenders.
• Demonstrates knowledge of violence against WHRDs in the context of both online and Offline
• At least 3 years of experience in conducting trainings on safety for HRDs generally
• Ability to develop specific safety guidelines for WHRDs
• Demonstrated knowledge of the shrinking Civic Space
• Familiar with feminist and gender approach to documentation of women’s stories.
• Proven experience in writing manuals, booklets etc.

Language Requirements

• Fluency in written and spoken English is essential
• Working knowledge of another official UN language is an asset;
• Knowledge of Uganda and the Great Lakes region is an asset

Application Procedure

Interested qualified individual consultants must apply online by latest by November 6th 2020. Candidates should submit one PDF File attachment containing:

1. a letter of interest,
2. a personal CV and
3. UN Women P11 dully filled form with at least three (3) professional references (UN Women Personal History Form (P11), can be downloaded at: http://www.unwomen.org/about- us/employment;
4. technical and financial proposal.

Note: The above documents need to be submitted and uploaded to the online application system as one document.