UN Women, grounded in the vision of equality enshrined in the Charter of the United Nations, works for the elimination of discrimination against women and girls; the empowerment of women; and the achievement of equality between women and men as partners and beneficiaries of development, human rights, humanitarian action and peace and security. Placing women’s rights at the center of all its efforts, UN Women leads and coordinates United Nations system efforts to ensure that commitments on gender equality and gender mainstreaming translate into action throughout the world. It provides strong and coherent leadership in support of Member States’ priorities and efforts, building effective partnerships with civil society and other relevant actors.

Uganda has continued to accommodate refugees fleeing from surrounding regions. Inflows of refugees from the conflict-ridden areas of South Sudan and the Democratic Republic of the Congo continued as of April 2017. A total of 901,755 South Sudanese arrived in Uganda (as per 17th April 2017, UNHCR) due to violence or persecution, 86% of whom are women and children.

As the refugee population grows in Uganda, it is also critical to ensure host populations can adequately support the new influx. The Government of Uganda has made refugee-hosting areas a national priority through the Settlement Transformative Agenda (STA), which is aligned to the NDP II 2015/16 - 2019/20. The STA is supported by the UN Country Team through the Refugee and Host Population Empowerment (ReHoPE) strategy. The ReHoPE focuses on progressively enhancing social service delivery in refugee-hosting areas (including life-saving interventions in Protection, Health & Nutrition, WASH, and Education), with a view to integrating services within local government systems, and on emergency livelihoods within refugee hosting areas. As per Government policy and in order to promote peaceful co-existence with host populations, all refugee interventions in Uganda must include 30 percent host community support (e.g., for every 100 refugees, some 30 members of the host community should also benefit).

Gender perspective in humanitarian action is vital to understanding the different needs of women, girls, boys and men in order to generate positive and sustainable outcomes. In times of crisis gender roles and dynamics change, women often resort to negative coping mechanisms and SGBV becomes more prevalent. High levels of violence including sexual abuse, harmful traditional practices, and assault, characterize the life of women refugees who fled the conflict in South Sudan. In addition, in refugee settlements the rule of law is weak and perpetrators of SGBV are rarely held accountable for their actions. It is essential to capture these issues in Uganda’s humanitarian response, both at the individual programming level in project design and in programme analysis and development.

The Inter-Agency Standing Committee (IASC) Policy on gender emphasizes the importance of humanitarian assistance on meeting the needs of the most vulnerable women. Providing targeted livelihood and protection support to women in refugee settlements also has a ripple effect on the wellbeing of their families and communities.

Women, Peace and Security and Humanitarian Action (WPSHA) is one of five thematic areas of UN Women Uganda’s strategic plan, and an area in which UN Women coordinates and leads the UN system. The WPSHA section, is responsible for knowledge functions, technical support, programme inception, interagency coordination, monitoring and accountability of the UN system to key frameworks and intergovernmental support on the full WPSHA agenda.

In 2017-2018 UN Women Uganda is supporting the Government of Uganda to: Design and develop the next NAP1325; Draft the National Peace Policy; support the implementation of the 3rd Peace, Recovery and Development Plan for Northern Uganda and to train OPM departments on gender responsive early warning, disaster management and refugee response.

In addition, since 2014, UN Women, along with humanitarian partners, has been supporting a gender mainstreaming response to South Sudanese refugee emergency in Uganda aligned to the UN ReHoPE strategy and the UN Women global LEAP flagship programme. Also in line with its global humanitarian strategy and peace and security program interventions in Uganda, UN Women’s support has aimed to: mainstream gender equality and women’s rights in UN and government of Uganda’s humanitarian responses; capacity building of OPM and other humanitarian actors; review of policy and legislative frameworks; protection from violence against refugee women and girls, including, psycho-social and legal aid support for refugee women, promotion of peaceful coexistence among refugees and host communities; and supporting increased collection and use of gender statistics and analysis in the emergency response.

Under the direct supervision of the Coordination Specialist, the Gender and Humanitarian Officer analyzes political, social and economic trends and supports formulation, management, operation, humanitarian partner support and evaluation of program activities within his/her portfolio and provides advisory services to partners in local government, UN and CSOs in West Nile and Northern Uganda. Through the Coordination Specialist, provides analysis for formulation of strategies and briefings to senior management while being based in Yumbe with regular travel to the Refugee settlements in Northern Uganda.

Summary of Key Functions:

• Administration and implementation of humanitarian programmes, processes and procedures;
• Finance, administrative and monitoring and evaluation support to Humanitarian programmes;
• Advocacy support and facilitation of knowledge building and management.

Technical Support:

• Under the guidance of the supervisor, supports the organisation, coordination, monitoring and support to the activities of UN Women Humanitarian Projects in West Nile and Northern Uganda and partners in relation to the administrative implementation of the project;
• Participates in the formulation, design, implementation, monitoring and reporting of UN Women Humanitarian Programmes in West Nile and Northern Uganda;
• Provide technical advice and support to implementing partners and to apply lessons learnt and recommendations from project evaluation;
• Ensure quality and timely implementation of the programme, including documentation of good practices, success stories as well as high quality and timely reporting for results;
• In close collaboration with partners, monitor programme delivery and take timely corrective action as necessary, in line with UN Women policies and procedures;
• Maintain budget awareness and ensure funds are utilised in line with agreed plan and budgets. Entering projects into Atlas, finalization of contribution agreements; determination of required revisions; coordination of the mandatory and budget re-phasing exercises, closure of projects through review;
• Financial and substantive monitoring and evaluation of the projects, identification of operational and financial problems, development of solutions;
• Maintain awareness of contractual obligations with donors and ensure full compliance of reporting requirements;
• Conduct environmental policy scanning on a continuous basis for West Nile and Northern Uganda and regularly update and advise the head office accordingly.

Planning, Monitoring, Evaluation and Reporting:

• In collaboration with the Monitoring and Evaluation Specialist  – collect, compile, analyse and share periodic data/ information on programme performance to inform continued programme efficiency and effectiveness;
• Ensure effective application of RBM tools, establishment of management targets (BSC) and monitoring achievement of results, in close collaboration with the M&E Specialist;
• Ensure that aggregate reports are regularly prepared and submitted on time.

Administrative and Miscellaneous Duties:

• Ensure all travel undertaken complies with all requirements for travel and is approved in line with the travel plan;
• Assist in writing program proposals;
• Other duties as required.

Functional Competencies:

Advocacy/Advancing A Policy-Oriented Agenda:

• Preparing information for advocacy;
• Identifies and communicates relevant information for a variety of audiences for advocating UN Women’s mandate.

Results-Based Programme Development and Management:

• Contributes into results through primary research and analysis;
• Assesses project performance to identify success factors and incorporates best practices into project work;
• Researches linkages across project activities to identify critical points of integration;
• Monitors specific stages of projects/programme implementation;
• Analyzes situation to identify gender and humanitarian programme opportunities in West Nile and Northern for project development and implementation;
• Participates in the formulation of project proposals and ensures substantive rigor in the design and application of proven successful approaches and drafts proposals accordingly.

Building Strategic Partnerships: Maintaining a network of contacts:

• Maintains an established network of contacts for general information sharing and to remain up-to-date on partnership related issues;
• Analyzes and selects materials for strengthening strategic alliances with partners and stakeholders, including identifying of areas for strengthening of capacities.

Resource Mobilization:

• Providing inputs to resource mobilization strategies;
• Analyzes information/databases on potential and actual donors;
• Develops a database of project profiles;
• Identifies opportunities for project proposals for presentation to donors, in close consultation with senior management.

Promoting Organizational Learning and Knowledge Sharing:

• Basic research and analysis;
• Generates new ideas and approaches, researches best practices and proposes new, more effective ways of doing things;
• Documents and analyses innovative strategies and new approaches.

Job Knowledge/Technical Expertise: Fundamental knowledge of own discipline:

• Understands and applies fundamental concepts and principles of a professional discipline or technical specialty relating to the position;
• Possesses basic knowledge of organizational policies and procedures relating to the position and applies them consistently in work tasks;
• Strives to keep job knowledge up-to-date through self-directed study and other means of learning;
• Demonstrates good knowledge of information technology and applies it in work assignments;
• Demonstrates in-depth understanding and knowledge of the current guidelines and project management tools and utilizes these regularly in work assignments.

Core Competencies:

• Demonstrating/safeguarding ethics and integrity;
• Demonstrate corporate knowledge and sound judgment;
• Self-development, initiative-taking;
• Acting as a team player and facilitating team work;
• Facilitating and encouraging open communication in the team, communicating effectively;
• Creating synergies through self-control;
• Managing conflict;
• Learning and sharing knowledge and encourage the learning of others. Promoting learning and knowledge management/sharing is the responsibility of each staff member;
• Informed and transparent decision making.

Education:

• Master’s Degree or equivalent in Social Sciences, especially in gender studies, Gender Based Violence or related field.

Experience:

• 5 years of relevant experience at the national or international level in gender equality and women’s empowerment programming and implementation as well as providing management advisory services, hands-on experience in design, monitoring and evaluation of development projects;
• Demonstrate analytical and advocacy skills on gender equality, women’s rights and empowerment of women issues especially with regard to policy advocacy in line with security council resolution 1325, CEDAW and BFPA;
• Familiarity and experience with UN inter-agency coordination processes and or results based management for advancing gender equality and women’s rights would be an asset;
• Strong links with national networks on gender equality and women’s rights in Uganda;
• Experience in capacity building, gender mainstreaming and gender auditing required;
• Experience in the usage of computers and office software packages, experience in handling of web based management systems.

Language:

• Fluency in written and spoken English, advanced spoken level of local languages in West Nile and Northern Uganda and basic working knowledge in any of the UN working languages in Uganda.