ActionAid Nigeria Strategic Opportunity Fund: Support for Women’s Rights and Feminist Organizing

 

ActionAid Nigeria, with funding from Global Affairs Canada through the Renewed Women’s Voice and Leadership Project, has opened a new call for Expressions of Interest for its Strategic Opportunity Fund. This fund is designed to strengthen feminist organizing and support rapid, timely, and impactful interventions that advance the rights of women and girls across Nigeria.

The opportunity is aimed exclusively at women-led organizations, women’s rights networks, and women human rights defenders, particularly those challenging unequal power structures and advancing gender justice.

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About the ActionAid Nigeria Strategic Opportunity Fund

The Strategic Opportunity Fund is a fast-response financing mechanism that enables organizations to implement short-term interventions with immediate relevance to women’s and girls’ rights. The fund is intended to support actions that protect vulnerable groups, sustain advocacy momentum, and respond effectively to emerging gender-related challenges.

The initiative aligns with the broader objectives of the Renewed Women’s Voice and Leadership Project, which seeks to elevate feminist movements and support community-driven strategies that impact the daily lives of women and girls.

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Funding Categories

Applicants may apply to only one of the fund’s three categories. Each category addresses a different type of intervention:

1. Emergency Intervention Fund

This category supports urgent responses to unplanned or crisis situations such as natural disasters, conflicts, political instability, or sudden policy changes that disproportionately affect women and girls.
Funding: N10,000,000 per grant | Up to 12 grants annually

2. Critical Intervention Fund

This category focuses on short-term advocacy efforts and strategic opportunities that can influence public policy, elevate feminist voices, and strengthen women’s movement-building.
Funding: N6,000,000 per grant | Up to 13 grants annually

3. Women Human Rights Defenders Intervention Fund

This category offers protection, emergency assistance, and wellbeing support for women human rights defenders who face threats, violence, or intimidation as a result of their activism.
Funding: N17,711,495 per grant | Up to 4 grants annually

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Eligibility Criteria

To qualify for the Strategic Opportunity Fund, applicants must meet the following conditions:

• Be a women-led organization, women’s rights network, or woman human rights defender working to advance the rights of women and girls.
• Be operating within Nigeria.
• Propose an intervention that is strategic, time-sensitive, and capable of achieving measurable impact.
• Clearly demonstrate how the intervention contributes to gender equality, gender justice, and systemic change.
• Show capacity to implement activities within a short timeframe.
• Priority consideration will be given to initiatives serving structurally excluded groups, including:
  • women and girls with disabilities
  • women and girls in conflict settings
  • returnees and women on the move
  • female inmates
  • survivors of gender-based violence
  • out-of-school girls
  • elderly women
  • women in politics

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Submission Requirements

Applicants must use the official Strategic Opportunity Fund application template. Submissions must include:

• Completed application form
• Organizational profile (or personal profile for women human rights defenders)

Applicants may submit only one application and must apply to only one fund category. Any application not submitted using the required template will be disqualified. Due to high volume, only shortlisted applicants will be contacted.

ActionAid Nigeria will not cover any costs associated with the application process.

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Timeline

The call for applications opened on January 22, 2026.
The fund operates on a rolling basis throughout 2026, subject to the availability of funds.

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How to Apply

Applicants must submit their completed Expression of Interest and required documents via email to:
rwvl.sofgrant@actionaid.org

Email subject line format:
Strategic Opportunity Fund – [Chosen Category]
(For example: Strategic Opportunity Fund – Emergency Intervention Fund)

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Supporting Feminist Action Across Nigeria

The Strategic Opportunity Fund reflects ActionAid Nigeria’s ongoing commitment to supporting feminist organizing, protecting women human rights defenders, and ensuring that women and girls in all their diversity have access to opportunities that promote their rights, safety, and dignity.

By enabling rapid, high-impact interventions, the fund strengthens the collective power of Nigeria’s women’s rights movement and promotes sustained progress toward gender justice.

Application link can be accessed from here.

To know more about such opportunities, click here.