NGO advocates strategies to strengthen peacebuilding initiatives across Nigeria-Benin border

By Mariam Abeeb

Search for Common Ground (SFCG) Nigeria, an international peacebuilding organisation focused on ending violent conflict, has called for the adoption of targeted strategies to strengthen peace initiatives across Nigeria-Benin border.
The Country Director of SFCG, Mr About Ouattara, made the call at a High Level Dissemination of Research Findings on Maturity Index of the Peace Architecture Platforms in Niger, Kwara and Kebbi States.
The project, under the Nigeria-Benin Border Peace Initiative: Enhancing Collaboration for Peace and Security (ECPS) initiative, was organised by SFCG in collaboration with the French Embassy in Abuja.
Quattara said that the Nigeria-Benin Border Project Maturity Index Assessment Report was aimed at strengthening peace and security in border communities across Kebbi, Kwara, and Niger States.
He explained that the maturity index provided a clear framework for measuring the effectiveness of peace platforms across five areas: governance and structure, community engagement, resource availability, conflict mitigation capacity, and resilience.
“SFCG is an international NGO whose mission is to foster collaboration between divided lines. Conflict is something inevitable, but what we have to do is to avoid conflict from becoming violent.
“That is why wherever we work, we try to get funding from our partners like the French Ministry of Foreign Affairs helping us to implement this project working with communities to teach them how to deal with conflict using collaboration instead of violence.
“We are working on the Niger-Nigeria and Benin border because they face many problems like banditry and other violence.
“So, it is very important for this collaboration to continue in a peaceful way so that people on both sides of the border will continue their economic relationship without any violence”