Advocacy Officer (JISRA / Peacebuilding) - Jos Base at TearFund

Location: Jos, Plateau

Job Description
Main purpose of the job:

• The post holder is in charge of all issues related to advocacy and peace building at the national levelwith a focus on the implementation of the “Joint Initiative for Strategic Religious Action” (JISRA) project with Tearfund Nigeria current two partners.
• The post-holder will support Tearfund’s partners towards the successful implementation of the Extra-Religious Pathway (Advocacy) of the JISRATheory of Change.

Position in organisation:

• Reports to the JISRA Project Manager Consortium Lead (JISRA/PoV) Nigeria
• Dotted line management with the Tearfund Nigeria Advocacy Manager
• Grade: Level 5
• Works directly with Tearfund’s partners in Nigeria involved in peacebuilding or advocacyprogrammes and project
• Works closely with other in-country Tearfund staff and partner staff in Nigeria to build advocacyand peace building capacities.

Tearfund’s Christian Culture:
We believe that prayer and discernment is fundamental to Tearfund achieving its mission of restoring relationships, ending extreme poverty and transforming lives. As a Tearfund staff member you areexpected to:-

• Engage with Tearfund Prayers and the Prayer hub
• Lead or participate in spiritual sessions of prayer and Biblical reflection within your group
• Be committed to Tearfund’s Mission, Values and Beliefs statement and to be actively working andliving in accordance with Tearfund’s Christian beliefs and theology of mission
•  Maintain your own spiritual development, discover your gifts/callings and grow in discipleship

Organisational Requirements:

• S/he will be expected to live out Tearfund’s values as they represent Tearfund externally
• Post-holder is expected to fulfil their personal objectives set by their line manager, contribute totheir team’s overall objectives, take responsibility for reviewing their ongoing personaldevelopment and maintain an awareness of Tearfund's strategy.
• Tearfund staff share responsibility to promote and maintain a strong safeguarding culture,including identifying the key actions they should take given their role and responsibilities.
• S/he will be expected to behave in accordance with Tearfund's "Code of Conduct", as stated inthe Staff Conduct Policy.

Scope of Job

• Provide direct oversight for capacitating and facilitating religious actors to work towards theimplementation of JISRA and the promotion of Freedom of Religion or Belief (FoRB) leading toInclusive, open and constructive religious communities, peaceful interaction between religious communities and context- and religion-sensitive FoRB policies and security practices in Nigeria.
• Provide and support Peacebuilding initiatives by Tearfund Nigeria and its associated partners.
• Some budget development and management responsibility
• Some travel within Nigeria

Duties & Key Responsibilities
Awareness Raising and amplification of JISRA Voices around Freedom of Religion or Belief(FoRB):

• 1.1 Support Tearfund/JISRA implementing partners, alongside other local implementing consortiumpartners, to increase religious actors’ consciousness of biases, prejudices, harmful practices andteachings through challenging discriminatory discourses. To transform radicalization and extremisttendencies (Pathway I). Work to encourage interreligious action and addressing mutual andcommon grievances (Pathway II).
• In line with (1.1 above), to equip religious leaders, women and youth champions with local evidenceand skills to bring forward their own perspectives on FoRB targeting national and internationaldecision makers. This will lead to the amplification of these perspectives by consortium’s advocacyand lobbying activities (Pathway III ).
• Support Tearfund/JISRA implementing partners to increase media actors’ understanding of FoRBrights through proven evidence and access to local voices, as well as enhancing accurate reportingon FoRB which results in the reduction of hate speech and propaganda, thus improving the publicdiscourse (the same time, pathways II and III).

Capacity Strengthening for Change towards Freedom of Religion or Belief (FoRB):

• Support the two Tearfund/JISRA implementing partners to empower religious actors to challengeand address deeply rooted harmful norms, practices and discourses; and advocate for alternativesfrom within local communities and social networks. (Intrareligious pathway III)
• Support the two Tearfund/JISRA implementing partners to draw the JISRA consortium’sexperience and materials deploying these in promoting faith literacy, counter narratives andcommunity discussions serving to sensitize local authorities and media outlets and influence thepublic FoRB agenda. (Intra-religious pathway I)
• Support the two Tearfund/JISRA implementing partners and other implementers to work with keyactors in transforming radicalization and extremism through enabling youth, women and religiousleaders to lead in repairing broken relationships – between youth and elders, citizens and localstate actors – so the community can address grievances together. In undertaking this task, specialcare should be taken to increase the religious understanding of youth, bolstering young people’sresistance to recruitment and empowering the circle around them to be the frontline against violentextremism. Additionally, through a human security approach, bridge the divide between securityactors and local communities (Intra-religious pathway I)
• 2.4 Support the five Tearfund/JISRA implementing partners to leverage existing formal and informalstructures that encourage and facilitate interaction between communities with the intent offacilitating meaningful interaction of people with different identities resulting in the reduction oftensions. (Inter-religious Pathway II)
• Related to (2.4 above) support religious actors to design and implement interfaith actionsresponding to local problems enabling people from different backgrounds work together, creatingnew social capital and resilient social fabric thus enhancing their capacity to identify and addresslocal grievances, using social and power analysis tools). (Interreligious Pathway II)
• Supported by participative grant-making enable the five Tearfund/JISRA implementing partners toequip, nurture and connect the interfaith pioneers and platforms which results in connectedreligious actors and pioneers leverage their power to seek buy-in from key stakeholders(bureaucrats and politicians).(Interreligious Pathway II)
• 2.7Support the five Tearfund/JISRA implementing partners to connect local experiences and realitieswith national and international policy levels through advocacy through creating, capacitating andfacilitating (interreligious) coalitions and build on existing national and international religiousnetworks.(Extra religious pathway III)
• Related to (2.7 above) Support the five Tearfund/JISRA implementing partners to bring localexperiences to the national table and use them as an incentive to adopt policies that hamper FoRBpractices at local level e.g. rigorous security policies or government restrictions on religion. Addedto this will be lobbying efforts targeting established religious institutions to put FoRB promotionhigher on their agenda. (Extra religious pathway III)
• Support the two Tearfund/JISRA implementing partners to highlight the importance of local andreligious perceptions on FoRB for effective policies and capacitate local FoRB champions toparticipate in international advocacy serving to contribute to improved policies at variousinternational levels through proving context sensitive interpretations to FoRB policies. (Extrareligious pathway III)

Research and Advocacy Engagement:

• 3.1 Support the two Tearfund/JISRA implementing partners to work at developing a coherent advocacyplan consistent with the strategies and approaches for engagement of the key actors in the JISRAToC and project document with a view to delivering the objectives around the Extra-religiousproject pathway III
• Support the two Tearfund/JISRA implementing partners to work with local knowledge institutionsand identified well known Dutch researchers to contribute in increasing the consortium’s and localpartners legitimacy by not only substantiating lobby and Advocacy engagements for FoRB andPeacebuilding policies with compelling research but also ensuring accessibility and relevance ofthe research and policy recommendations.
• 3.3 Related to (3.1) above, support the two Tearfund/JISRA implementing partners to increase thecapacity of religious actors to engage with high-level decision makers using policyrecommendations from evidence-based research in (3.1) above to bring about policy change inFoRB and peacebuilding.
• Support the two Tearfund/JISRA implementing partners to capacitate and connect religious actorsto lobby and advocate for more effective context- and religion-sensitive FoRB and peacebuildingpolicies.
• Related to (3.3) above, support the two Tearfund/JISRA implementing partners to capacitatereligious actors to challenge concrete divisive and rigorous securitization policies.
• Support the two Tearfund/JISRA implementing partners and the other implementers to generate arange of knowledge products: manuals, lobby strategies, M&E evidence for future interventions.

Documentation and Learning:

• Support the two Tearfund/JISRA implementing partners to document results, impact and learning ina coherent and accessible way that supports replication and future work.
• Produce Monthly, Quarterly and Annual reports for Submission to the JISRA Project Manager(Nigeria Consortium Lead) for onward submission to JISRA and Tearfund.

Capacity Strengthening and Project Coordination for Peacebuilding:

• Support Tearfund partners in the design, development, monitoring and evaluation, and wherenecessary, ensure the delivery of projects in the area of Peacebuilding/Social cohesion andensuring that robust conflict and conflict sensitivity analyses inform the design and implementation.
• Coordinate and, where appropriate, lead on equipping partner staff and local peacebuilderswith peacebuilding and advocacy skills.
• Work alongside local partners to nurture, equip and connect a network of local peacebuilders,enabling them to share learning and best practices, and provide mutual support to each other.When required, provide support to the network in undertaking joint initiatives, advocacy initiativesin particular, seeking to bring about policy change at any level of governance in FoRB andpeacebuilding.

Networking and Partnership:

• Support the two Tearfund/JISRA implementing partners to build robust relationships with localreligious leaders, teachers, women and youth leaders, local media outlets, community members,local authorities and security actors with a view to generating a groundswell of support forinfluencing FoRB and peacebuilding policies.

Person Specification
Qualifications:

• Educated to Degree level or equivalent relevant experience.
• Training in peace and securitystudies,
• Training in Advocacy
• Project Cycle Management

Experience (Essential):

• Minimum of three (3) years relevantexperience in the role.
• Proven capacity for sophisticated analysisof FoRB issues.
• Proven experience of working in aninter-faith initiatives.
• Proven experience in brokering, negotiatingand lobbying.
• Proven experience in designing andfacilitating participatory learning processes.
• Proven experience of successfullyimplementing donor funded program

Desirable:

• Project managementexperience
• Experience withlocal/Christian/church basedNGOs
• Development work withChristian and/or InternationalNGO
• Interfaith peace building andsecurity related work
• Media engagement
• Security engagement

Skills / Abilities:

• Excellent written and verbalcommunication skills.
• Fluency in written and spoken English.
• Good computer skills (WORD, EXCEL,POWERPOINT) etc
• Excellent interpersonal skills includingsensitivity in cross culturalcommunications.
• Ability to collate, analyse and report datain a clear and coherent manner
• Ability to produce compelling research andcommunicate the outcome of resultsresulting in influencing the public.
• Ability to prioritise and work underpressure
• Ability to influence in a diplomatic manner
• Ability to work with children or vulnerablepeople in an appropriate and safe mannerin accordance with the Tearfund ChildProtection Policy
• Ability to communicate confidently andcomfortably about own personal faith
• Ability to lead and facilitate team prayerand Bible studies
• Ability and commitment to apply biblicalprinciples prayerfully within all aspects ofthe role
• Working knowledge of localmajor language (Hausa)

Personal Qualities:

• Personal Christian maturity
• Ability to work as part of a team and underown initiative
• Ability to respond quickly and effectively tochanging circumstances
• Active member of a local church
• Culturally sensitive
• Non-judgmental
• Relational in approaches
• Ability to relate to peoplefrom a variety of diversecultural and religiousbackgrounds
• Desire to train and developothers