In advocating for girls education, Buky Williams is listed as Malala Fund Education Champion
Malala Fund has named Buky Williams, Executive Director of Education as a Vaccine (EVA) as one of its 2020 Cohort Education Champions in Nigeria. This announcement was made by Maliha Khan, the Chief Programmes Officers at Malala Fund. As a strong advocate of quality education, Buky responds to the needs of girls to go to school and gain skills to be financially empowered.
EVA has been building the agency of adolescent girls and young women in Kaduna state for years- by providing them with vocational training and linking them up to economic empowerment opportunities to be able to return to school and complete their secondary education. We equally build their capacity to tell their own stories, advocate for their rights and hold government accountable for policies and laws that directly affect them.
Our team will implement the Advocating for Girl Education Project where we will engage the Kaduna State Government and relevant communities to advocate for the rights of young girls to free education and the abolishment of hidden fees levied by the primary and secondary schools in Kaduna State. We will achieve this by building an alliance of community and government stakeholders who will develop and implement an advocacy and communication strategy to engage government stakeholders on the implementation of the free education mandate, especially for girls.
EVA will select some girls and train them on social accountability processes; advocacy and budget tracking; and accountability for free education for all girls in the state.
According to Khan, “… as COVID-19 threatens to force millions of more girls out of school, Champion-led programmes and advocacy work is now even more important. We are proud to welcome this cohort of innovative advocates into our network”.
“This is also an exciting next step in EVA’s continued efforts towards achieving Goal 4 – #QualityEducation of the #SDGs in Nigeria”, Buky said
Written By: Bayo Olanrewaju Ewuola
