Every successful community intervention must involve all the stakeholders and beneficiaries to foster ownership, collaboration and achieve meaningful impact. At the Art and Global Health Center Africa, we use the Human-Centered design approach to ensure that all the interested groups are involved at every step. Our philosophy is simple: “Tell me, and I will know; teach me, and I will learn; involve me, and I will understand.”
We are in the Third Phase of implementing the Tiyambe project which seeks to empower women, men, girls, and boys to influence change, shift behaviors around gender-based violence and promote gender equality, with the goal of improving people’s lives in their communities. We will be engaging communities surrounding Phwazi, Esperanza and Glenorchy which lie in separate development areas in the Mulanje district. Before starting this phase, we held separate Area Development Committee (ADC) meetings in three Traditional Authorities (TAs), namely, TA Nkanda, TA Njema and TA Mabuka in the district. These were eye opening engagements for both our team and the members of these committees.
Participants were taken through the GBV service gap analysis tool which was administered in order to understand challenges within the referral pathway. Through the tool, we were able to uncover some of the roadblocks impeding the access to justice for GBV survivors. We observed that the ADC members from TAs Nkando and Njema were unaware that the letter from the Village Chief is no longer a requirement in GBV service provision. Members form Nkando cited that the lack of a health facility in the area frustrates survivors from reporting cases of abuse as they cannot afford to incur travel costs nor walk longer distances to the nearest facilities. All the three separate ADCs highlighted the need for community level post service support to the healing journey of survivors.
In TA Mabuka, the ADC members emphasized that men do not open up when they face violence, making most interventions target women and that there’s need for projects to help men’s attitudes on GBV reporting. Much as cases are referred to legal services, most cases are not completed due to many challenges including survivor fatigue and transportation issues. They also highlighted lack of collaboration and cooperation between parents and NGOs especially on child marriage cases which makes it hard for community members to meaningfully participate in the cause.
Nevertheless, these local and area level development agents have a crucial role to play in minimizing these identified gaps. The participants took turns in expressing their commitments in addressing these prevailing problems through the Tiyambe Project. The ADC members agreed to strengthen coordination with other key community leaders and stakeholders, take a proactive role in reporting GBV cases to the right authorities, and raise awareness about the Tiyambe project and its goals. Additionally, they said that they will be disseminating the right information about GBV, gender-related laws and available reporting mechanisms and assist in enforcing existing community by-laws that are there to prevent GBV and protect the victims/survivors.
Considering that the TfD performances that the project uses only target four communities per estate, the participants assured us that they will make sure that community TfD performances are done in more villages for a wide awareness of the key messages. The also said that they will continue making meaningful use of the GBV related expertise and knowledge beyond the project duration. The ADC meetings involved buying their inputs, identifying the existing gaps and mapping the way forward for the success of the project without reinventing the wheel rather recognizing the works and efforts that other organizations have done to reduce GBV in communities surrounding Phwazi, Esperanza and Glenorchy tea estates.
Art and Global Health Center, Africa (ArtGlo) is implementing a three-year Tiyambe project to promote gender equality and address gender-based violence in communities surrounding tea and macadamia estates in Mulanje and Thyolo districts from 2021-2024. The organisation responds to Eastern Produce Malawi (EPM)’s call for the development and delivery of community civic education programmes concentrating on ending gender-based violence and promoting gender equality in two districts.
