Lagos State Domestic and Sexual Violence Agency (DSVA), in collaboration with the Ford Foundation, has inducted 300 students from Education District V into the Kings and Queens Club after weeks of orientation to stand against any form of Sexual and Gender Based Violence in the State.
Executive Secretary, Mrs. Titilola Vivour-Adeniyi, said that the initiative was designed to establish a sustainable social framework within educational institutions, aimed at dismantling socio-cultural misconceptions and promoting empowered femininity.
Vivour-Adeniyi, represented by the Agency’s Programme Officer, Zainab Alaka, stated that the initiative also seeks to build a network of trained students who act as peer educators and advocates for positive expressions of femininity and masculinity within their schools.
She noted that the clubs would equip participants with deeper knowledge about Gender-Based Violence, empowering them to critically examine prevailing societal norms that sustain gender inequality while also challenging myths and false beliefs surrounding violence.
Vivour-Adeniyi said empowering and inaugurating the students into the King’s Club and Queen’s Club Initiative was expedient as children are amongst the statistics of victims, prey to paedophiles and other forms of abuse.
Also, the Agency’s Head of Community Engagement and the Project Coordinator for King’s club and Queen’s club, Damilare Adewusi, said that the programme is aimed at reaffirming the state government’s zero tolerance for all forms of Sexual and Gender Based Violence, and to address the grappling issues of violence that individuals and communities are faced with.
While urging them to speak out and report any case of sexual violence in their community, Adewusi said the purpose was to help the young boys and girls to imbibe the act of discipline in the fight to end Sexual and Gender-Based Violence in Lagos.
Adewusi, also the Project Coordinator for the Kings and Girls club, urged the students to continue to strive for excellence and champion a world free of all forms of Sexual and Gender-Based Violence and to see themselves as ambassadors and change agents in society.
One of the teachers from Ansar-Ud-Deen Society Senior Grammar School Badagry, Linda Orji, who commended the efforts of the Agency in ensuring attitudinal change in the society, said the effort would tackle the menace of Gender-Based Violence and the prevention of child, domestic and sexual abuse in Lagos.
A student of Araromi Ilogbo Secondary School, Oko-Afo Badagry, Ayomide Amoo, stated that he has learned a lot from being in the king’s club, and that the club has shown him how not to be harmful in society. Rather, to report any forms of Sexual and Gender-Based violence to the authorities.
Also, a student of Ajara Senior Grammar School, Badagry, Efe Heaven, stated that he would always be a peer educator and advocate of positive femininity and masculinity in society.
Meanwhile, after taking the pledge of allegiance, the students from the Education District V were subsequently inducted into the club and awarded certificates and identity cards to validate their induction into the club.
So far, over 3,900 boys have been inducted into the King’s Club, while about 3400 have been inducted by the agency into Queen’s Club, totalling 7300 students inducted so far.
We are training these Students as our Ambassadors who would train their peers towards breaking the culture of silence, which encourages GBV to thrive.
The partnership with Ford Foundation and DSVA is based on the mutual desire to institutionalise and mainstream prevention efforts into various sectors, including the education sector, and ensure that children are adequately armed with the relevant tools required for protecting themselves.
