Reclaim Your Life Project

The project grew directly out of our Voices of Freedom work with secondary school students. Through the children, we saw that their futures were shaped by their mothers' struggles with domestic violence, large families and financial dependence. Many women stayed silent about abuse because they relied on their husbands for support, and few had access to reliable family planning information.

1. Held advocacy visits, market outreach and town hall meetings with community elders, gatekeepers, market women's leaders and faith groups.
2. Created a monthly women's safe space, run by the women themselves, covering financial independence, girl-child education, safeguarding, reproductive rights and women in political leadership.
3. Ran capacity building on reproductive health rights, family planning options and child spacing, facilitated by the family planning department of Ikotun Primary Health Centre.
4. Developed a family planning manual, validated it with health authorities, and launched it at a community event attended by stakeholders from across Lagos.
5. Trained women in financial literacy, saving, investment and small business management with business consultants and a financial institution partner.
6. Established VSLA groups so women could save together and access small loans.
7. Partnered with FIDA Lagos and the Family Support Unit of the Nigeria Police, Ikotun, on legal rights and reporting domestic violence.
8. Launched a VSLA sustainability initiative in which members teach each other skills such as liquid soap making and pastry and snack production.

• Ikotun Primary Health Centre recorded a 30% increase in women seeking health checks and family planning after the training.
• Women gained confidence to speak in community forums and town hall meetings and to advocate for their neighbourhoods.
• Mothers who once saw early marriage as their daughters' main path now invest in their education, including buying JAMB forms.
• Women reported that domestic violence cases were taken more seriously after sessions with the police Family Support Unit.
• VSLA members built savings, restarted or started businesses and added new income streams for their families.
• Women formed lasting solidarity networks and began leading their own awareness sessions.