Gender and Protection Officer at COOPI - Cooperazione Internazionale

COOPI - Cooperazione Internazionale is an Italian humanitarian non-governmental organization founded in Milan in 1965. COOPI aims to help the world’s poorest to improve their access to healthcare, food, and financial security, and to overcome their special vulnerability to wars, civil conflicts and natural disasters. For 50 years of long-term support and constant presence in the field, COOPI has been engaged in breaking the cycle of poverty and responding to specific emergencies in numerous sectors, including Food Security, Humanitarian Aid, Health, Socio-Economical Services, Water and Sanitation, Disaster Risk Reduction, Human Rights, Education and Training, Migrations and Sustainable Energy.

COOPI started its operations in North-East Nigeria in July 2014 to carry out a rapid evaluation of the most relevant constraints suffered by the Internally Displaced People (IDPs) displaced by the food crisis and the Boko Haram insurgency in the Lake Chad Basin.

The COOPI Nigeria Field Office is located in Sokoto State, in order to cover intervention LGAs in Sokoto State and to provide direct assistance to the IDPs and their hosting communities, through a multi-sectorial program covering Food Security, Disaster Risk Reduction, Social protection, Early Recovery, and Livelihoods, Nutrition and Child Protection interventions. COOPI's capacity to respond to the humanitarian situation in the country is confirmed by its experience in providing humanitarian aid in more than 27 other Countries around the World, in over 50 years of operations.

We are recruiting to fill the position below:

Job Title: Gender and Protection Officer -Yobe (1 position)

Location: Yobe
Employment Type: Full Time

Overall responsibilities

• The gender and protection officer will be responsible for supporting implementing the minimum measures for mainstreaming gender and protection as outlined by the Humanitarian Principles, the SPHERE Standards, WFP Policy on Gender and Protection and the Inter Agency Standing Committee Guidelines.
• The Gender and Protection Officer is mainly responsible for mainstreaming gender and protection across the various components and activitiesin Yobe State.
• He / She will create and develop protection and Gender integration activities in line with the priorities determined by COOPI. He/she will ensure performance tools are available for local staff, in order to guarantee smooth implementation of the programs, while taking into consideration the local cultural context.
• This position is responsible for the implementation, monitoring and follow-up of the Gender mainstreaming and general protection activities of the project, ensuring that gender-related issues are addressed effectively, and contributing to the creation of an inclusive and equitable work environment

Duties and Responsibilities
Under the direct supervision of the MEAL Manager, the Gender and Protection Officer will perform the under listed tasks:

• Work closely with the project team and the beneficiaries to ensure activities are being implemented in a gender and age sensitive manner.
• Prepare, organize and conduct the protection-oriented Focus Group Discussions and Gender Discussion Meetings during project implementation
• Ensure equal participation of women and men in the activities and ensure to have an appropriate complaint and feedback mechanism to collect the communities’ feedback in a gender sensitive manner and ensure that the programme includes these feedbacks throughout the project implementation
• Meet regularly with the program team to fine-tune programming, ensuring activities are implemented using a gendered lens
• Support vulnerable individuals identified during project implementation.
• Ensure Do No Harm approach is applied in all activities conducted with the site and host communities.
• Supports project staff to mainstream gender in beneficiary identification and verification.
• Ensures gender is mainstreamed in various stakeholder meetings and capacity building.
• Prepares and forwards to the MEAL Manager monthly work plans and progress reports for the entire projects based on set indicators for the 5W matrix and any other required reporting to partners and donors;
• Identify program gaps and suggests to the Program Manager and MEAL manager mitigating actions in periodic reports;
• Collects and documents success stories and photographs for reports; Follows and enforces all COOPI codes of conduct and policies (globally and in-country); Protection, gender and AAP are to be integrated into the partner monthly narrative report. Additional reports to be shared include: safety audits, protection monitoring scorecards, protection risk assessments and outcome of consultation with PMCs and the affected population on the impact of food assistance.
• Submit weekly and monthly work plans along with detailed activity reports to the MEAL Manager.

Capacity Strengthening:

• Build the capacity of the project staff on Protection and GBV-related issues, in order to enhance internal knowledge and expertise and provide qualitative delivery of activities with high protection standards and enhance protection sensitive approach within the targeted communities.
• Translate gender and protection mainstreaming into concrete, practical actions (awareness-raising, training and on the job mentoring) of project colleagues.
• Lead the delivery of the protection and gender components of the social behavioural change communication;
• Conduct training and/or awareness raising for project teams on mainstreaming protection and integrating gender;
• Support to implement good practice in data protection and privacy;
• Support awareness-raising of the food security team and the affected population on the prevention of sexual exploitation and abuse.

Protection Analysis:

• Conducting joint protection risk and gender analysis with Donors and Internally as required;
• Accountability to Affected Populations (consultation, information provision and complaints and feedback mechanism management)
• Contribute to the design and implementation of approaches related to information provision, community consultation, feedback and complaints mechanisms;
• Establish and consult Project Management Committees.
• Understanding the conflict context;
• Carefully considering the interactions between planned or ongoing interventions and the
• Analyze the conflict context, identifying the conflict drivers/ dividers and the connectors;
• Acting upon the understanding in programme design and implementation, to minimize
• potential negative impacts by emphasizing the connectors and diminishing the dividers; and
• Responding to changes in conflict dynamics by adjusting programming.

Networking and Partnerships:

• Establish and maintain collaborative relations with relevant donors, partners, project stakeholders and other organizations
• Maintain effective relationships with Protection, GBV and CP clusters and related working groups at national level
• Ensure that main protection concerns are brought to relevant stakeholders to advocate for the respect of human rights and minimum protection standards.
• Reduce the risk of a lapse or relapse into violent conflict by directly addressing root causes and consequences of conflict;
• Strengthen national, community and individual capacities to address conflict constructively; and
• Lay and support foundations for sustainable peace and development.

Protection Monitoring:

• Monitoring and communicating to the MEAL and Program Managers changes in the protection environment; Document barriers faced by certain groups in accessing safe and meaningful assistance (child headed households, people with disabilities, separated and unaccompanied minors, women headed households) and provide Program Manager with appropriate adjustments to ensure inclusion of most vulnerable and at-risk categories;
• Mapping and communicating protection (including gender-based violence and child protection) referral pathways to Program Manager and on-site help and feedback desk;
• Ensure safe and confidential referrals of protection cases for the provision of food assistance to COOPI Programmes.

Gender:

• Coordinate and ensure implementation of gender mainstreaming in all EFP-funded COOPI’s program
• Lead and conduct gender analyses, technical studies, and assessments on gender in project activities
• Ensure that program activities are carried out with cultural sensitivity while promoting gender equality and inclusion of marginalized groups
• Leads in integrating gender into MEAL processes, setting specific indicators for process monitoring and advising team in obtaining gender specific information.

Required Profile

• Have a university degree in one of the following fields: psychosocial peacebuilding, psychology, social work or relevant fields. A Master’s degree is preferred.

Experience and Skills:

• Minimum of 3 years of relevant professional experience working in a humanitarian organization or with displacement affected populations.
• Have facilitated/ co-facilitated psychosocial support trainings to key stakeholders that include refugees, internally displaced persons (IDPs), security, local and community leaders with excellent command of trainees in relevant fields.
• Experience in capacity building of staff and or case managers in mental health and psychosocial support.
• Basic understanding of trauma and how to help participants manage the effects of trauma that often arise during workshops due to their personal experience of societal violence.
• Demonstrate leadership skills, active listening skills, initiative and personal discipline, etc.
• Have good computer skills and mastery of MS Office tools.

Qualities:

• Adhere to COOPI values and abide by the code of conduct and other policies.
• Ability to maintain confidentiality and handle sensitive information.
• Mastery of English (fluency in spoken and written languages).
• Have a knowledge of a local language preferably Hausa and Fulani.
• Candidates should be from Yobe state

Application Closing Date
8th May, 2026.