NGO Donates Mama Pack to Support Victims of GBV

The Women’s Helping Hands Initiative (TWHHI) has donated mama pack to support women and girls who were victims of Gender Based Violence (GBV) in order to help them over maternal depression.

Speaking during the presentation of the mama pack in Lagos yesterday, the Programme Coordinator, Mrs. Omowunmi Omotayo, the event is an off shoot of their rehabilitation services to support survivors of gender based violence, noting that many of the women the foundation has in it shelter came only with the clothes on their back in the beginning, “so we realised that they have a lot of financial strain, coupled with the trauma they have gone through.”

She expressed confidence that providing the mama’s pack would reduce the financial strain they have gone through, thereby reducing maternal depression and encourage them to visit hospitals for delivery, “this will help reduce maternal mortality and enhance child survival. By the time they have these items in this mama’s pack, we are upholding their dignity.”

Omotayo also noted that the aim of the foundation is to reach out to 100 women who are survivors of GBV, adding that some of the women are from their shelters and others are from partner organisations and volunteers they work with in Lagos.

“The mama pack will be given to women in our shelter, and some will go to our partner organisations. We have been doing this initiative since 2006 and we have been running our shelters since 10 years. Since 2006, we have been giving the mama’s pack in-house, but this time around with the support of our sponsors, we are giving it to people outside our organisation. What this initiative means to me is impacting lives from a ground zero to a place of hope and ensuring that lives are changed. We nurture them to ensure that they can support other people.”

She further explained that tackling GBV is a continuum and there is no one side fit all approach, adding that everyone has a role to play either through advocacy, or strengthening the existing policies.
She hinted that in tackling the issue of GBV, there is need for more advocacy to ensure that people have the right information to which would change their orientation, “in that way we can have more people on the right side of anti-gender based violence.”

Omotayo expressed confidence that a lot of work is being to tackle the issue of GBV and the younger generation are more aware of it and they are playing their role because of the advocacy.