ActionAid (AA) Nigeria is an affiliate of ActionAid International, which is a global alliance of organisations working towards achieving a world without poverty and injustice in which every person enjoys the right to a life with dignity. As a large and visible development organisation, we work in more than 40 countries in Africa, Asia, Europe and America. Our expertise lies in community-led approaches to development and working through partnerships with the poor and other grass root organisations.

We are recruiting to fill the position below:

Job Title: Consultant Writer, Phase Out Documentation of Kwara, Kaduna and Gombe Local Rights Programme

Locations: Kwara, Kaduna and Gombe

Background

• AAN is implementing a final phase out of its Local Rights Programme in Kwara, Kaduna and Gombe.
• LRP was established to enable ActionAid to achieve its vision and mission of working with the poor and excluded people. It was known as the Partnership Against Poverty (PAP) until 2012 when the new structure of ActionAid Nigeria was established. The programme now became known as Partnerships and Local Rights Programme.
• In 2002, ActionAid Nigeria (AAN) decided to move beyond the single theme intervention, dependent on donor funding and introduced the child sponsorship mechanism which is an AAN fund-raising mechanism to support its development work in its thematic areas.
• Under these mechanisms, a sponsor from Italy or other Alliance Partner Country is linked to a child in the community and bond is built between both which leads to improvements in the child’s community to his/her family’s benefit.
• This long-term integrated development programme is called the Local Rights Programme (LRP) which is currently being implemented in 13 states, including Kwara, Kaduna and Gombe.
• The main objective of the LRP is to improve the socio-economic status of poor women, men, and children in LRP states by mobilizing communities and building their capacities to implement people centred development programmes using the Human Rights Based Approach to programming.
• This is done through a three-pronged approach. Empowering grassroots community through rights consciousness and supporting locally initiated projects, capacity building of local institutions and supporting policy advocacy initiatives that ensure that the voices of people living in poverty are listened to and their rights respected.

Achievement of the programme objective was dependent on the realisation of these expected results:

• Strengthening of the capacity of community members to hold duty bearers (governments and other stakeholders) accountable through advocacy leading to increased access to healthcare, education, improved livelihood among other gender responsive services.
• Strengthening of communities to demand and claim their rights by bringing about gender responsive services by Government and in response to community engagements.
• Strengthening capacities of women through mentoring and monitoring of women peer circles has led to the reduction of some harmful traditional practices and gender-based violence.
• Capacity building on modern farming and agroecology has made poor farmers in the communities to be aware of best agricultural practices and in turn, increased the quantity of harvest in the communities and improved livelihoods.
• Capacity building on agroecology and ways to mitigate the effect of climate change has led to increased level of food security in the communities and increased income from sales of improved yields/outputs.
• Formation of girls’ safe spaces in their communities has created a platform for resolving issues such as gender-based violence. This has made girls more empowered to take control of their lives.
• Training of youths on election process and good governance has led to the empowerment of community youths including persons with disabilities as well as increased participation in electoral process as election observers and aspirants.
• Execution of physical projects like construction/renovations of blocks of classrooms and healthcare facilities has led to improved quality of education received by children and increased access to healthcare services in the communities.
• Child message collection has increased children’s enrolment in school and reduced social vices in communities.
• As the programme is being phased out, it is important that the impact of LRP work in the focus state is documented in print. The documented stories will be used in developing newsletters and support ActionAid fundraising.

Target Audience/s
The target audience for the stories of change write up are the Project Beneficiaries, Key Community Stakeholders, relevant Ministries, Departments and Agencies, donors, and partners. The stories should help the audience to:

• See that the LRP has contributed towards improving the livelihood of women, men, youth and children across the target location by equipping them with necessary life and economic skills towards attainment of improved socio-economic status.
• Beneficiaries were selected based on need and vulnerability status through a transparent process that promotes community participation and ownership.
• Believe that LRP strengthened the capacity of relevant government Institutions by addressing the challenges of knowledge and competency gaps to coordinate and manage issues in the state.
• Do compel the audience to share the stories of change for dissemination. The content should also help inspire the audience to act by sharing the content as a best practice and inspire donors to want to support ActionAid further.

Content Gathering Guide
ActionAid’s general guide for case studies collection of stories of change:

• A minimum of 15 stories of change (per state) across AAN’s six thematic areas i.e Education, Health, Women’s right, Governance, Food and Agriculture, Human Security in Conflict and Emergencies. Each theme must have at least two stories.
• Interview a range of people involved in the programme to create a well-rounded selection of stories. This will include CEO and staff of partner organisation.
• Interview the groups which ActionAid works with and for: In this case members of communities, community stakeholders and relevant Ministries, Departments and Agencies.
• Ensure that the case studies selected link to the tangible elements of the service areas of the programme.Case studies for a high value audience are strongest when they focus on services delivered, impact and outcomes.

It is also useful to think of it in terms of a story with three parts:

• Issue – what were the challenges before the programme?
• Action – what did the programme do to tackle it? What actions were taken?
• Impact – what was the impact of the programme on the selected case study – individually and the general audience?

The content should generally highlight:

• Programmes’ response to lack of opportunities and gender responsive service delivery by empowering communities and modelling alternatives towards changes in lives of programme beneficiaries.
• Improved livelihood for poor and excluded persons and communities.
• Programme sustainability after the phase out of the Local Rights programme
• Community members (parents, teachers, youths, women, religious groups) increased knowledge on their rights and demanding for it.
• Increased capacity of relevant government institutions in coordinating and responding to demands of the community.
• Documented work with vulnerable groups in communities, persons with disabilities, widows, orphans and other vulnerable groups.
• Evaluation of the child sponsorship programme and its impact on sponsored children, their families and communities.

Deliverables
Specific Outputs:

• The consultant will submit a writeup of programme stories of impact in booklet format and with quality action pictures which have been professionally edited.
• This must be a fair mix from the list of interviewees provided and from all programme locations.
• S/He will be working with ActionAid staff/partner to capture suitable photos.
• All outputs from this consultancy belong to ActionAid Nigeria and may not be used for any personal or commercial purposes.

Educational Qualification

• Master’s Degree or equivalent in Social Sciences, Economics, Development Studies or related field.

Experience:
The consultant is expected to have the following qualifications:

• Background knowledge of the state and the ability to speak common/local language of the state which the assessment will be conducted in.
• Hands on experience producing similar documentation of stories of change
• Experience of working in poor, rural communities of Nigeria
• Understanding and experience of working with state and non-state actors (at all levels)
• Knowledge of local governance and poverty contextual issues (desirable)
• The individual’s or his/her organisation’s work responds to the needs and interests of poor and marginalised women, men, aged, people living with disabilities and other forms of diversity
• Evidence of having undertaken similar assignments in the past
• Should be available within one week of consultancy offer

Competencies
Corporate Competencies:

• Demonstrates integrity by modelling ActionAid’s values and ethical standards
• Promotes the vision, mission, and strategic goals of ActionAid
• Displays cultural, gender, religion, race, nationality and age sensitivity and adaptability

Functional Competencies:

• Communication, interpersonal and professional skills required for collaboration with Government agencies as well as various community and state stakeholders.
• Ability to prioritize work and produce the required outputs in the given timeline.
• Strong oral and written communication skills.
• Excellent presentation skills.
• Excellent computer skills
• Must be result-oriented, a team player, exhibiting high levels of enthusiasm, tact, diplomacy and integrity.

Assignment Location and Timeline

• The assignment will require the consultant to visit 5 focal communities and MDAs in Kwara/ Kaduna/Gombe states. It is estimated that he/she will spend 5 full days in the field (exclusive of travel days) with 2 reporting days.
• Field visit is slated between 5th – 18th February 2023 with submission of draft report latest by 30th February 2023 and final report latest 5th March 2023 or as agreed with ActionAid LRP team.
• Those applying for Gombe should be available to also undertake same task in Kaduna.

Work Arrangement & Reporting Lines

• The consultant will be expected to provide his/her own work equipment.
• ActionAid Nigeria will provide a list of interviewees and the Writer will be required to travel to the project state. ActionAid Nigeria will provide the following for field visit.
  • Accommodation
  • Transportation
  • Per Diem
• The consultant in his/her work, will be accountable directly to ActionAid Nigeria’s LRP Manager and Communications Coordinator.

Consent & Child Protection Policy
Consent Guideline:

• It is essential that we are to be able to demonstrate that all contributors (non-ActionAid staff) have given informed consent for their names, images, and stories to be used. Ideally this should be written consent. A sample consent forms, for individual and a group, are included with this TOR and a final consent form will provided by ActionAid prior to the first content-gathering trip.
• If it is not possible to get written permission (e.g., the situation doesn’t allow, the contributor is not literate) please get a verbal consent on video camera – please include the explanation and request as well as the contributor’s consent.
• If the contributor is under the age of 18, written or on-camera verbal consent must be provided by a parent or legal guardian.
• If written or video consent is not given by the contributors and handed over to ActionAid, we will be unable to use the case study.

Child Protection Policy:
The following guidelines are in line with our Child Protection policy:

• When filming a child, the child’s best interests should always be the primary consideration.
• Never photograph a child with the intent to shame, humiliate or degrade them, or perpetrate any form of emotional abuse.
• Children should never be depicted in erotic, seductive, provocative poses, or context (even if illustrating trafficking of girls, for instance).
• Ensure that all children represented in images are suitably dressed. We should never use images of nude children, children that appear to be wearing no clothes or children in transparent clothes. We should also never blur nude areas or use props to cover areas that are not clothed.
• The caption of an image of a child should never include the child’s full name (Exception: Child Sponsorship material targeted directly to child sponsors.) We should also never disclose personal details, email, postal address, and telephone numbers other than if these details have been knowingly and openly provided by the child themself (See section on Consent Form) and the child is aware that these will be provided with the images.
• Try to show children in their context, showing the reality of their lives, the environments in which they live and the circumstances that make them vulnerable.
• Where possible, show children as active and resourceful. Where relevant, include families, parents, or carers.
• Where possible, show how ActionAid works with children, rather than showing them as alone and vulnerable.

SHEA and Safeguarding

• ActionAid is committed to preventing any form of sexual harassment, exploitation and abuse (including child abuse and adult at-risk abuse) and responding robustly when these harms take place in line with our zero-tolerance approach to Safeguarding concerns.

Availability

• The Consultant will support AAN as agreed in this EOI and as subsequently agreed between S(he), LRP Manager, Communications Coordinator, or any other person authorised to negotiate with him/her on behalf of the organisation. S(he) is therefore to indicate availability within specified timeframe stated in this EOI.

Terms of Payment

• The consultant shall be responsible for his/her tax and other statutory obligations.ActionAid shall however deduct the statutory 5% (individual) / 10% (Corporates) With Holding Tax (WHT) and remit to relevant authority. The Consultant should provide AAN his/her Tax Identification Number (TIN) for the purposes of remittance.

Application Closing Date
21st January, 2023.