Saferworld has a track record of challenging policymakers through advocacy and amplifying the voices of those affected by conflict. We work in collaboration with local and national organisations to effect change at regional and global levels.

People in Tonj North in Warrap State, South Sudan, have experienced years of conflict within and between communities. Women and girls face not only the effects of violent conflicts but also harmful cultural and gender norms – including forced and child marriages.

As part of a United Nations Peacebuilding Fund (UNPBF) project, Saferworld works with partners in the region to challenge harmful norms and safeguard women’s and girls’ mental and physical health – including by supporting women’s centres, which are helping women and girls like Monica and Mary to speak out against abuse and get access to justice.

Monica’s story

When Monica* was 17, her parents gave her some unexpected news. An older man (around 60) from the community was able to pay the high bride price her parents had set – a large herd of cows – and soon Monica would marry him. She had no choice:
“My parents threatened to beat me up should I refuse. The threats continued even when I got married. On the day of the ceremony, I saw people celebrating and enjoying themselves including my best friend’s father, who I believe was also waiting for the same to happen to his daughter. It was not my happiest day in life. I didn’t experience the joy other women get in their marriages. My husband was abusive, and the trauma broke me – making me feel helpless,” Monica confessed.

Monica’s new home was far from peaceful: she was constantly maltreated, sometimes went to bed hungry and received no medical attention when she fell ill or for the injuries her husband inflicted. She was forced to have sex with a young man whom she believed to be one of her husband’s relatives so he could produce kids with her.

“I felt depressed and extremely angry. I had low selfesteem, rage and I felt frustrated. I had sleeping problems every night and found it difficult to build relationships even with fellow girls, and difficulty trusting others, especially my parents, strangers and the men and boys I had known before,” explained Monica.

Around this time, one of Monica’s neighbours attended a Youth Peace Forum, where she heard about how a women’s centre in Warrap was helping girls like Monica. She told Monica all about it, and Monica decided it was time to seek some support.

A ray of hope – towards justice

“I remember, my ever best and good time was when I first met with Brianna,* a community mobiliser who works for Women Development Group at the women- and girlsfriendly space. She said to me, ‘my dear sister, please be strong and believe in yourself, you have come to the right place, and we shall fight the battle together.’ After going to the women’s centre, I learnt about the different types of violence against women and girls and I also learnt that it is unacceptable and punishable by law. I told her my whole story: my parents sent me to that man just for their own ambition, because they were greedy for wealth – and because of that, the man continued to beat me up almost every day. I didn’t know that abuse was unacceptable, and I didn’t also know where I could find help because my parents had threatened to beat or disown me.”

Monica’s story moved people working at the centre, and they were able to take her case to the authorities.

“[After I shared my story] the Hon. County Commissioner promised to handle the case on my behalf. I was happy when he took out his mobile phone to make a call to the judge. He explained the case to him and told him, ‘I don’t want to hear girls are forced to get married at their young age in this county.’

“The County Commissioner ordered the immediate arrest of my father and my husband. They spent several days in police custody and later appeared in court. I was walking on air when the judge passed his verdict freeing me from that marriage. Now I am free and I am so glad for the women- and girls-friendly space in Tonj North. If not for them, by now I would be dead, because that was the only thought that I had throughout my marriage until I spoke to someone from the women’s centre.

“The support that the counselling provides is essential, as survivors often face the further discrimination of having to confront the stigma and rejection resulting from their experience … More women and girls face situations worse than what I have experienced.

“Now, I continue to tell other women and girls who face violence from their parents or husband where they can go to get help. Thanks to the psychosocial sessions the women at the centre ran with me, I was able to externalise the pain that was hidden in me,” said Monica.

Mary’s story

“I was forced to marry an unknown man, I felt betrayed by the people I trusted the most – even my brothers who I grew up with surprised me by taking the side of my father to the point of threatening to beat me up if I refused to marry the man my father and uncles arranged for me. Their decision frustrated me. It shattered my dreams and left me with no hope in life.”

Mary’s* experience of forced marriage in exchange for cattle – a practice known as ‘bride wealth’ – had a big impact on her mental health and happiness. At 21 years old, Mary became aware of a safe space for women and girls in Tonj North County, Warrap State. She decided to take a training course there on understanding gender and conflict, supplemented by mental health and psychosocial support. Saferworld and the Women Development Group conducted the training.

“Now that I have rediscovered my sense of living again, my story is going to inspire women and girls in our society. I will be an advocate for the rights of my fellow vulnerable women and girls in our state.”

Mary described the training as a turning point for her, providing skills to help her to heal from trauma and stress. She also learnt basic counselling skills to be able to help others. “I feel I have started to heal, I no longer feel like a prisoner, cornered or betrayed. My story is just one of the thousands of similar situations women and girls in our community go through due to their parents’ desire to acquire wealth and the cultural norms that denied us our rights as girls and women in Dinka society.

“Now that I have rediscovered my sense of living again, my story is going to inspire women and girls in our society. I will be an advocate for the rights of my fellow vulnerable women and girls in our state.”

Safer spaces

Funded by the UNPBF, this project is the first initiative to integrate mental health and psychosocial support into conflict- and gender-based violence responses in South Sudan’s Wunlit Triangle (the shared border area of Lakes, Warrap and Unity States).

Friendly spaces for women and girls provide safe platforms to identify and discuss mental health issues related to gender-based violence. More than 175 women and girls like Mary, from seven counties in the Wunlit Triangle, are using safe spaces to resolve disputes in their communities, raise mental health and psychosocial support needs to local leaders and service providers, and offer first aid to women and girls who have experienced violence or abuse from their spouses or parents and other relatives. These safe spaces/women-friendly spaces offer women and girls a platform to confront taken-for granted cultural norms and practices that, in addition to discriminating against women and girls, could lead to violent conflicts.

Matthew Kurapio, from the Women Development Group, explains: “Our job is to make women and girls feel safe, empower and treat them with utmost respect and empathy. This is the essence of this project and I commend the United Nations Secretary General’s Peacebuilding Fund.”

The effects of climate change – particularly drought – are contributing to conflict across Uganda and Kenya, as people compete for scarce resources such as crops, water and pasture. Increased levels of gender-based violence, disease, conflicts over land and rising migration have also been linked to the climate crisis.

With gaps in climate change policies and legislation, organisations are finding unique ways to adapt and to address communities’ needs with practical solutions. One of these is the IMARA partnership programme in Kenya, where we are working with consortium and civil society partners to increase the resilience of vulnerable households to climate change-related shocks through diversified livelihoods and improved natural resource management and use.

We talked to David, Mohammed, Leonard, Geoffrey and Tebanyang from four of the organisations we partner with in Kenya and Uganda to find out how climate change is impacting the people they work with, and how they are adapting to build peace.

David Kangole and Mohammed Yusuf, Turkana Pastoralists Development Organization (an IMARA partner), Kenya
How has climate change affected people in Turkana? Has this increased conflict?

People face numerous challenges ranging from drought, food shortages at home, animal diseases, human health issues like malnutrition in children, scarcity of water in some areas (especially pastoral regions), and insecurity within county and national boundaries. Climate change has affected pastoral community households’ nutritional status, leading to increased acute malnutrition. It has also led to communities relying on less preferred food intake and skipping meals as a way of survival.

Conflicts have also intensified along border areas because of these climate changes – there is competition for access to water and pasture across county and community borders as a result of shortages. Host communities are resistant to allow pastoralists from Turkana to occupy their lands and use their forage crops and water. During a project in Kalopetase village in Turkana North, people stated that, because of climate change, they were forced to migrate towards Uganda to look for pasture and water. When reaching Urum, on the border of Uganda and Kenya, they faced a serious attack from host communities; all their livestock were taken away and they also lost some of their relatives to the incident.

Leonard Kamsait, Chief Officer for Water, Environment, Natural Resources and Climate Change, Pokot Youth Bunge County Forum (an IMARA partner), Kenya
How has climate change affected the people you work with?

Harsh climatic conditions have resulted in massive movement and migration of people and livestock from Kenya into Uganda in search of water, pasture and food. In the process, daily sources of livelihoods are affected, and conflicts increase due to pressure on resources in the new areas. Learning in schools is affected (schools may be closed because of conflict, or children leave school when their families migrate). Due to destructive human activities such as deforestation and poor farming practices that leave the ground bare without any cover, the highlands of West Pokot (Lelan, Tapach, Batei and Sekerr) frequently experience landslides, leading to massive displacement of people, destruction of property and even deaths.

Are you working on ways to mitigate or adapt to the effects of climate change?

Yes, we are sensitising members of the community to start growing fast-growing crops that are drought resistant, and practice small irrigation farming along the riverbanks and existing dams. We also: encourage community groups to set aside pasture farms and store the harvest for usage during drought season, support community action groups to identify priority needs in key sectors (water and pasture), and lobby for funding and implementation by relevant government authorities/departments. We are also encouraging farmers to embrace crossbreeding of livestock to have livestock that are resistant to drought and diseases.

Geoffrey Odong, Project Coordinator, Gulu Women Economic Development and Globalisation, Uganda
How has climate change affected your community?

Climate change has led to serious land conflicts. In Balalo in Northern Uganda, pastoralist communities cross from South Sudan to Uganda to raid cattle in Lamwo district. This creates violent cross-border conflicts between landowners and pastoralist communities. Dangerous weapons like small arms, spears, bows and arrows are sometimes used against animals and people.

Climate change has also increased vulnerability levels among people experiencing poverty and other marginalised communities. For instance, people whose homes have been destroyed by floods often become very vulnerable. People can resort to sex work to survive (which is criminalised in Uganda) – this can expose young girls and women to gender-based violence including economic violence, intimate partner violence and physical abuse. Cases of gender-based violence have also increased in households; especially physical and economic violence (when a spouse denies his or her partner access to, control and ownership of productive resources like money, assets, land and other resources). This is because in the Acholi traditional setting, a man is supposed to provide for his family but when he fails in his duties, like providing food and healthcare, the likelihood of conflict increases.

How is your organisation adapting to the effects of climate change?

We are supporting organised groups such as village savings and loan association groups – as well as religious and cultural leaders – in Acholi sub-region by providing tree seedlings such as teak, pine and eucalyptus tree seedlings. We then link people to government agricultural extension services for technical support. We’re also helping community groups with traditional or organic food crops that are resistant to drought, pest and diseases. We’re carrying out community sensitisation and awareness campaigns on climate change and disaster risk reduction, and we’re partnering with organisations involved in climate change-related work.

Tebanyang Emmanuel Arukol, Policy Analyst, Karamoja Development Forum, Uganda
How has climate change affected the people you work with?

Climate variabilities have exposed pastoralists and agropastoralists to livelihood losses such as crop failure and livestock losses and therefore hunger, leading to the loss of lives. It has led to unpredictable migration, especially of pastoralists from Turkana, Kenya, into Uganda, and by Karimojong pastoralists into other regions and districts of Uganda such as Acholi, Lango, Teso and Sebei. This has created conflicts due to rivalry over access and use of natural resources including water and pasture.

How are you working to mitigate or adapt to the effects of climate change?

We continue to form and strengthen local community groups that will protect land and share information between each other. This information is related to livestock diseases, livestock market prices and climate information. We’ve also distributed mobile phones for information sharing. We have worked with partners to advocate for resilience programming such as land rights protection, securing grazing areas and corridors, and the development of infrastructure such as valley tanks and dams.

We’d like to see increased sharing of (understandable) climate information, more resilience programming, and documentation of traditional practices that enhance adaptation to climate change and the sharing of the same. We need to strengthen adaption mechanisms (adjusting to current and future climate change effects), not just mitigation (making the impacts of climate change less severe by reducing emissions).

What does it look like to fund based on the values of transparency, flexibility and solidarity? In 2019 we co-launched the Yemen Civil Society Solidarity Fund with Yemeni civil society to find out if new, transformative models of funding are possible. The fund provides grants of up to USD$45,000 and has so far supported 18 organisations, selected through a peer review process. Adel, Mathar, Akram Al-Hussein, Youssef and Adel from f ive of these organisations discuss their experiences of the fund.

Adel Abdullah Qaed Dahan, Executive Director, Basmat Hayat for People with Disabilities

Our vision is the comprehensive integration of people with disabilities into society. Our staff and management are all individuals with disabilities. Through the Yemen Civil Society Solidarity Fund, we delivered ten interventions to enhance the role of people with disabilities in peacebuilding and good governance. We’d never received funding that was this flexible before – many doors opened for us.

Our organisation gained good recognition and received excellent feedback from our audience and from people with disabilities. Also, the team’s financial and admin performance improved. The training we received strengthened our team’s skills in proposal writing, budgeting and financial reconciliation, and our understanding of good governance.

Donors could improve funding to Yemeni civil society by giving us the opportunity to assess needs and by giving us flexible funding that allows us to meet the community’s needs as well as our own. Donors can help strengthen our skills and support us until we become self-reliant and capable of raising funds. There are small civil society organisations that possess untapped potential and significant capabilities in conducting needs assessments and doing fieldwork. However, these organisations don’t have access to donors because of their weak organisational criteria. We need donors to collaborate with us, provide flexible multi-year funding, and create opportunities for us to meet with them.

Al-Hussein Ali Solan, Executive Director of Musaala for Human Rights, and Youssef Hazeb, Director of the National Organisation of Yemeni Reporters (Sada) (the organisations co-applied to the fund for one grant)

At Musaala and Sada our desire is to see a democratic, free and safe Yemeni society that respects human rights and basic freedoms. We took part in the Yemen Civil Society Solidarity Fund through our project ‘Support for strengthening community peace’, which aims to build trust and strengthen relationships between security forces and journalists, civil society organisations and human rights defenders in Marib governorate. Our taking part improved conditions for media, legal and civil work in Marib, and it also reduced harassment.

The fund gave us the opportunity to build strategic partnerships with security forces and other civil society organisations. This experience resulted in establishing coordination, collaboration and joint work between Musaala and Sada. This in turn enhanced our role in serving our community.

We noticed several positive changes in our organisations since the start of our participation in the Yemen Civil Society Solidarity Fund. Firstly, we were able to implement a project as partners – the principle of partnership was implemented successfully. We invested the funding in developing our internal capabilities, including developing internal procedures and policies, as well as purchasing digital accounting software. Secondly, we were able to build strategic relationships with security forces and other organisations. Thirdly, we were able to reach more people and provide them with better services. The funding we received helped us expand the scope of our work and provide our services to more people in need.

One of the most exciting things about the fund was its commitment to enhancing peace, justice and human rights in Yemen. The fund provided financial, technical and logistical support to civil society working to achieve these goals. At Musaala and Sada, we are grateful to the Yemen Civil Society Solidarity Fund for its support. We believe its work is necessary to enhance peace, justice and human rights in Yemen.

Mathar Abel Jabbar Abel Razaq Fayed, Executive Director of Assistance for Response and Development (Al-Awon)

Our foundation works to improve livelihoods and services at the individual and community levels in Taiz. Through this funding, we developed a project to address the urgent needs of young people in juvenile detention. We provided comprehensive humanitarian assistance to two detention centres in various sectors – education, health, food, shelter, mental health, water, sanitation, protection and security.

One of the good things about the Yemen Civil Society Solidarity Fund was that we were able to choose our project and weren’t limited to a specific sector. This enabled us to identify and respond to extremely critical needs of a group that wasn’t supported by others before. This opportunity also allowed us to engage and network with other civil society organisations, and to coordinate our efforts to provide the best possible assistance. We noticed an overall improvement in the quality of our foundation’s work and reporting. If donors provide continuous funding that ensures the sustainability of civil society organisations’ work and empowers them to become self-sufficient in the future, it will serve as a strong incentive for civil society to continue their work.

Akram Abdo Ali al-Sharaab, Director of al-Nahda Youth Organization

We work to improve the situation of the Muhamasheen [a marginalised group] and other vulnerable groups in Yemeni society, and to protect them from all forms of violence, marginalisation, exclusion, deprivation and racial discrimination. Our work mainly targets Muhamasheen youth and women. We used the funding to serve these marginalised groups, including by holding training workshops for youth and women.

The proposal evaluation and selection criteria through the various stages, whether conducted by Saferworld or peers, was outstanding. The process strengthened the capacity of the applying organisations and gave them a broader understanding through reading their peers’ proposals. The fund played an effective role in bringing civil society together and facilitating networking between us through the peer evaluation process, joint training workshops and meetings.

As a result of the funding, our organisation now has office equipment and furniture, a website that facilitates communication, an electronic finance system, and a large office that protects the privacy of the women working at the organisation. Muhamasheen youth now have experience in monitoring and documenting cases of violence throughout their communities. They also have a broad understanding of how to conduct advocacy campaigns for issues that affect Muhamasheen communities, and a basic understanding of formulating ideas and drafting projects. This is a great asset for the Muhamsheen communities.

Abdel Karim Saif Mohamad Ali al-Saalmi, Executive Director of Al-Wed Foundation for Development

We work in Taiz, where we strive to contribute to peacebuilding, supporting development and advocating for human rights. Through the fund we ran our project, ‘Education for Peace’, which addressed low literacy and numeracy skills among primary school students in 15 schools across Taiz governorate – areas directly affected by the war.

Previously, most donors and international NGOs provided limited funding with challenging application processes, and most funding is constrained by prohibitive conditions and often involves favouritism and lack of transparency in the selection of partners. The Yemen Civil Society Solidarity Fund provided flexible funding opportunities to Yemeni civil society to implement projects based on their existing capabilities and their own visions.

The project constituted a glimmer of hope for teachers. Teachers are desperate and depressed due to the worsening economic situation. Their salaries are not enough to cover the basic requirements of a dignified life. This project raised morale and created an educational movement in the target schools. There are several great success stories where several students were able to read well after the project.

Yemeni society is eager for peace and wants to end the conflict and the war. We want all donors to know that Yemeni society wants to help them end the war. We want them to know that Yemeni society supports them towards achieving comprehensive development while empowering civil society organisations to provide their services effectively.

The Civil Society Coalition on Human Rights and Counter-Terrorism came together through a shared recognition that decisions on counter-terrorism at the UN are leading to significant harms in countries across the world. The coalition has documented how counter-terrorism has become one of the primary means through which states violate rights, attack civic and humanitarian space, crack down on dissent, and advance authoritarianism. Many states have increased their efforts to shape the UN counter-terrorism architecture to undermine – and even dismantle – international norms on human rights, civic space, and other fundamental freedoms.

Saferworld USA hosts the CSO Coalition Secretariat and has been a leading voice within it in drawing attention to the shifting priorities of the UN. In September 2023 we published a series of videos showcasing the voices of civil society activists as the UN launched its New Agenda for Peace, followed by a podcast released to mark the International Day of Peace 2023.

An October 2023 Coalition Strategy review highlighted that most efforts made by the Coalition and its members have sought to disrupt, reform and transform narratives and policies related to counter-terrorism and human rights; that there has been some progress in shifting narratives related to the impact of counter-terrorism on civic space; and that Coalition members have successfully made space for civil society contributions in key UN counter-terrorism policy-making processes, including during the Civil Society Town Hall on the eighth UN Global Counter-Terrorism Strategy review and UN country assessment visits, as well as through advocacy at the national and regional levels.

Also in October 2023, the CSO Coalition – in partnership with Fionnuala Ní Aoláin (the UN Special Rapporteur on the promotion and protection of human rights and freedoms while countering terrorism), the Permanent Mission of Canada to the UN, and the Permanent Mission of Switzerland to the UN – hosted the event, ‘From Policy to Practice: Implementation of the Global Study on the Impact of Counter-Terrorism on Civil Society & Civic Space’.

This event brought together representatives of civil society, member states, the UN and others to discuss ways to implement the recommendations presented in the ‘Global Study on the Impact of Counter-Terrorism Measures on Civil Society and Civic Space’, produced by Fionnuala Ní Aoláin. Saferworld’s Policy Lead on the UN co-facilitated this event, and speakers included representatives from the UN Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights, the Canadian government, and three members of the CSO Coalition.

Saferworld, through its hosting of the CSO Coalition and through its own research and advocacy, continues to press for the UN (and other governments who continue to prioritise militarised approaches to security) to keep people-centred security at the heart of its peace agenda.

The ‘Resourcing Change’ project, which supports women’s rights organisations (WROs) in fragile and conflict-affected states, entered its second year. This flagship project has increased the independent role of WROs in leading programming and advocacy on peacebuilding, gender equality, women’s empowerment and participation, and genderbased violence prevention and response. The project is funded by the UK’s Conflict, Stability and Security Fund, and led by Saferworld in a consortium with Women for Women International and the Women’s International League for Peace and Freedom.

Through the project, 23 WROs and two women’s hubs in Nigeria, South Sudan and Yemen received core, flexible and easily accessible funds to enable them to respond to self-identified community needs and priorities. The project also dedicates separate funds for WROs to pursue self-identified capacity-strengthening priorities through training and peer-to-peer learning, and to advance their movement-building work locally, nationally and internationally – both individually and jointly with other WROs participating in Resourcing Change.

There is strong evidence that there is a multiplier effect when WROs and women-led CSOs have access to core and flexible funds. In all of the contexts, WROs reported that they were able to make decisions on how, when and where to implement projects, with interventions they considered best for the context. This flexibility enabled them to meet needs expressed by communities that other donors were not willing to meet – which in turn increased trust between WROs and the conflict- affected communities they operate in.

Child Bride Solidarity, South Sudan

One of the WROs, Child Bride Solidarity (CBS) in South Sudan, used its flexible funding to strengthen the voice and leadership of women in peacebuilding in Jonglei State. CBS’s approach included media trainings, women-led dialogues, supporting young women as peace leaders, and conducting media and social media campaigns. CBS also provided menstrual hygiene management (MHM) and sexual and reproductive health training, as well as menstrual pads, in schools. This increased young women’s access to and awareness of this information, services and supplies.

As well as increasing women’s access, CBS trialled a gender-transformative approach that raised boys’ awareness of MHM, increased interaction between boys and girls on the topic in schools, and addressed harmful social norms and masculinities that led boys to believe that periods are taboo rather than normal and natural.

This belief often translated into bullying behaviour by boys against girls, occasionally leading girls to miss classes or change schools. However, following the training, CBS noted positive changes among both boys and girls. It reported that after the training and an awareness-raising session, boys understood MHM was normal and natural, and they were open to being involved in the distribution of dignity kits. They also shared information from the sessions with their sisters, cousins and neighbours. Girls stopped missing classes and dropout rates and school transfers decreased.

CBS also implemented complementary initiatives to promote young girls and women as agents of positive change who can mobilise and engage their families and communities to support the campaign against harmful norms and taboos, as well as against harmful practices like child, early and forced marriages. These young women and girls are already speaking up and taking a greater role in decisions that affect them in their households and in their personal health, creating a strong foundation for their future participation at home and in the community.

This is a top-line summary of Saferworld’s income and expenditure in 2023–24, taken from our full audited accounts.