The Justice, Development and Peace Commission (JDPC) of the Catholic Archdiocese of Jos has launched a four-year peacebuilding project aimed at strengthening conflict prevention and community resilience in parts of Plateau and Kaduna states.
The initiative, known as Peacebuilding, Accountability, Resilience and Local Solutions (PeARLS), will focus particularly on vulnerable women, youths, internally displaced persons (IDPs) and persons with disabilities.
Funded by Christian Aid and implemented in partnership with the Christian Council of Nigeria (CCN), the project was inaugurated on Thursday under Christian Aid’s Community-Led Peacebuilding Signature Programme.
The intervention will cover four local government areas: Riyom and Bassa in Plateau State, and Kaura and Kauru in Kaduna State.
Speaking at the inauguration, JDPC Coordinator, Ms Benedict Daber, said the project was designed to respond directly to challenges affecting vulnerable groups while strengthening locally driven approaches to peacebuilding.
“This project is intentionally designed to respond directly to the challenges confronting women, youths, IDPs and PWDs,” Daber said.
According to her, PeARLS will operate through five interconnected areas: inclusive peace platforms, transformed relationships, early warning and early response, climate-resilient livelihoods, and accountability and learning.
She said the approach would help communities strengthen peaceful relationships and develop local mechanisms for conflict prevention, dialogue, reconciliation and social cohesion.
Daber said the project was not designed to impose external solutions on communities but to strengthen existing local capacities for maintaining peace.
“The project is not importing peace; it is investing in the peace that already exists in communities,” she said.
She added that the initiative would seek to rebuild trust where relationships had been damaged, amplify the voices of marginalised groups and strengthen community systems for preventing violence before it occurs.
The coordinator said the combination of peacebuilding, early warning, livelihoods and accountability was intended to help communities become more resilient while addressing some of the factors that can contribute to conflict.
The project is expected to run for four years across the four participating local government areas in Plateau and Kaduna states.
