The U.S. Department of State’s PGO is offering a grant to enhance counter-violent extremism efforts and foster trust in Mauritania.

A. PROGRAM DESCRIPTION

U.S. Embassy Nouakchott’s Program and Grants Office (PGO) of the U.S. Department of State announces a Request for Statements of Interest (RSOI) from organizations interested in applying for funding for program proposals that improve collaboration and trust between citizens and civilian government officials, and support women as effective peace and security leaders.

When confronted with the rise of violent extremism, most notably in the early 2000s, the GIRM started a structural metamorphosis to adapt, contain, and deter this new menace which threatens its existence: the violent extremists do not recognize the authority of the state whom they perceive as sympathetic to foreigners. In 2010, the Mauritanian government designed a Countering Violent Extremism (CVE) strategy that combines the use of military and non-military approaches to control and eliminate the threat. Some analysts believe that Mauritania’s success in preventing terrorist attacks on its soil since 2011 is due to its military posture, however, part of its success may be attributed to Mauritania’s increased narrative of promotion of tolerance. There’s little doubt that the GIRM is making progress but more remains to be done to reverse the trajectory imprinted by decades of extremist rhetoric and action.

It is important to continue to build the capacity of oulemas, fuqaha, imams, youth, and women – through the Ministry of Islamic Affairs (MOIA) – to improve the GIRM’s ability to fight extremism and to spread a narrative of acceptance. This will lead to more youth trusting government’s guidance, more Mahadras adopting official teaching curricular, more religious scholars trusting the government and disseminating its approach, including approach to peaceful resolution of grievances. These actions will result in decreasing extremist content in those spaces and reducing appeal for violence, especially to youth, as the only method of asserting positions.

In this regard, the U.S. Embassy seeks to expand on successes and recommendations from prior programming to make measurable progress on CVE in Mauritania.

The below areas have been identified as priorities with room for expansion under this program:

1.    Conflict mediation: Further help religious leaders to understand their roles within the national structure by providing them with resources and support and networking them with other ministry conflict mediators.

2.    Evaluating risk factors for terrorism: The ministry has a proven approach for capturing and disseminating information on risk factors to inform and establish evidence-based policies.

3.    Engaging productively with Mauritanian youth: The ministry has a clear policy and protocol on youth engagement, which could include more formalized structures to support it.

PGO invites organizations interested in potential funding to submit Statement of Interest (SOI) applications outlining program concepts that reflect these goals – pending funding availability. Please carefully follow all instructions below.

The submission of a SOI is the first step in a two-part process. Applicants must first submit a SOI, which is a concise, 1-3-page concept note designed to clearly communicate a program idea and its objectives before the development of a full proposal application. The purpose of the SOI process is to allow applicants the opportunity to submit program ideas for PGO to evaluate prior to requiring the development of full proposal applications. Upon review of eligible SOIs, PGO will invite selected applicants to expand their ideas into full proposal applications. Full proposals will go through a second merit review before final funding decision are made.

The request for Statement of Interest (SOI) will be posted on www.Grants.gov

Program Goal:

Improve the capacity of the MOIA to better design and implement pertinent CVE interventions involving youths, women, and religious leaders in target regions to counter violent extremism.

Program Objective:

·      The MOIA adopts and uses a proven approach to evaluating risk factors for violent extremism for women and youth (separately) to inform the design of programming protocols for priority populations.

·      The MOIA adopts policy and protocol to address the drivers for violent extremism among women in Mauritania, so that by 2023, MOIA will implement interventions within the identified target populations that lead to participants reporting satisfaction and confidence in the GIRM’s ability to address the concerns of women.

·      The MOIA adopts a policy and protocol to address the drivers for violent extremism among youth in Mauritania, so that by 2023 MOIA will implement interventions within the identified target populations that lead to participants reporting satisfaction and confidence in the GIRM’s ability to address the concerns of youth.