Project
Safeguarding the Rights of Transgender & Intersex Communities in Pakistan
- Rule of law
- Pakistan
- March 2024
The project objective is to work for the protection and promotion of human rights and fundamental freedoms of LGBTI persons, particularly transgender and intersex, in Lahore and Faisalabad districts. Expected outcomes include support for 5000 LGTQI/transgender persons; enhanced capacity of 50 civil society and human rights organizations; increased public awareness of LGBTI rights; registration of transgender and intersex persons for computerized national identity cards; improved policy framework and legal provision on the rights of transgender and intersex person.
Lessons from Project
- Rule of law
- Pakistan
- March 2024
In order to be effective, public awareness raising campaigns need to be more targeted and focused. The content should be developed in local language, keeping in view the general literacy level. It should also be evaluated to assess efficacy and impact. In this case the grantee developed them in English and published them without translation which limited their efficacy and outreach.
- Rule of law
- Pakistan
- March 2024
Meaningful and transformative change to safeguard rights of transgender community is possible through legislative action. Creating adequate legal frameworks and making justice work for transgender community requires rigorous policy advocacy and extensive engagement with policy and law makers. In this case, while the grantee took a number of initiatives including legal and policy review as well as development of a draft law on Transgender Rights, it met with limited success to generate ownership to steer the legal reform process due to limited engagement with parliamentarians and policy makers.
- Rule of law
- Pakistan
- March 2024
Connected, aware and empowered CSOs and Human Rights Defenders can become a strong catalyst for change at the grassroots level in order to promote local action aimed at promoting transgender persons’ rights. In this case, the engagement provided them a chance to liaise and establish a link with government officials and departments which continued beyond the project.
- Rule of law
- Pakistan
- March 2024
While working on promoting rights of the transgender community, it is important to focus equally on demand creation through activities enhancing the rights awareness of the community focused on by the project, along with strengthening institutional capacity of public sector institutions for inclusive service delivery.
- Rule of law
- Pakistan
- March 2024
Effective institutionalization of a technology driven initiative in government departments requires an assessment of their capacity and readiness. Technical and capacity support may be provided to ensure smooth transfer and successful adoption of technology. In the present project, an App developed to report human rights incidents and violations was handed off without prior assessment to a public office unprepared for ensuring its maintenance and use.
- Rule of law
- Pakistan
- March 2024
The project experience clearly indicates that project interventions when anchored in or leveraging existing government initiatives have greater stakeholder endorsement and higher chance to sustain. In this case, the grantee successfully tapped in and leveraged existing government initiatives that support, for example, the issuance of identity documentation as well as literacy and nonformal education.