Livelihood and Economic Empowerment Specialist

Livelihood and Economic Empowerment Specialist -A Community-Centred Approach to Transforming Criminality and Violence in the Niger Delta

Location: Port Harcourt, Nigeria (5 months)

Search for Common Ground (Search) is an international non-profit organization that promotes the peaceful transformation of conflict. With headquarters in Washington, DC and Brussels, Belgium, Search’s mission is to transform how individuals, organizations, and governments deal with conflict—moving away from destructive approaches and towards cooperative solutions. With more than 700 staff worldwide, Search implements projects in more than 30 countries in Africa, Asia, Europe, the Middle East and North Africa, and North America.

Position Summary: Search is seeking an experienced Livelihood and Economic Empowerment Specialist for a consortium project in Rivers, Bayelsa and Delta States. The role will specifically oversee the implementation of livelihood and economic empowerment initiatives across a total of 33 LGAs and 66 Communities in Rivers, Bayelsa and Delta States  during the 6 months No Cost Extension Period within the implementation timeline of the project. The project is funded by the European Union and implemented in consortium with Search for Common Ground, Stakeholder Democracy Network and Partnership Initiative in the Niger Delta. 

The overall goal of the project is fostering inclusive community security approaches to address the systemic drivers of violence and criminality in Bayelsa, Delta, and Rivers States. 

The position requires an experienced livelihood and economic empowerment specialist with extensive experience in leading implementation of similar initiatives addressing the conflict drivers comprising loss of livelihoods, environmental degradation and unemployment targeting youths, women and communities at large. The position holder must be organized and experienced in supervising a team of livelihood programme consultants and an infrastructure advisor consultant who will support the delivery of the livelihood initiatives. 

The position holder will work closely with the Project Manager and EWER team and structures across the project LGAs and Communities. She/he will work under the direct supervision of the Head of Programme Implementation; Niger Delta. 

Bringing together three leading peacebuilding and development organizations in the Niger Delta, the consortium offers a holistic, community-centred approach to addressing core drivers of criminality, violence, and conflict in the region, with a specific focus on the empowerment and inclusion of youth in the security of their respective communities in the Niger Delta . The consortium partners will leverage existing relationships with the action’s diverse target groups, including at-risk youth, local communities impacted by oil production and oil bunkering, state security actors, the private sector, journalists and media actors, key civil society organizations, and policymakers at the state, regional, national, and international levels, to secure broad-based buy-in and participation in the action. Overall, the project is initiating a shift in the way that relevant actors think about and approach issues of oil bunkering, criminality, and security in the Niger Delta in favour of more bottom-up, human-centred perspectives. This institutional and social shift is necessary in order to sustainably reduce the prevalence of oil bunkering and other forms of criminality and violence in the region in the long-term.

The design of the action centres around four activity streams, each addressing a systemic driver of division, violence, and criminality in Bayelsa, Rivers, and Delta States: 

Stream 1 will foster intra-community collaboration around issues of social exclusion, lack of economic opportunity, and environmental degradation.

Stream 2 will build trust and collaboration between communities and government and security actors for more participatory, community-centred security operations.

Stream 3 will leverage arts- and culture-based approaches to foster social cohesion between divided communities both online and offline.

Stream 4 will facilitate policy change to institutionalise community-centred security approaches at the local, state, regional, national, and international levels. 

Interested candidates should send the following to our Career Portal.

Current resume

Cover Letter (which includes expectations of compensation and projected start date)

Please note that the system only has the functionality to upload two documents per application. Incomplete applications will not be accepted.

This advert will close on the 12th May 2025