What’s New

March is dubbed as Women’s month, with the 8^th March being set aside as International Women’s Day. The UN Secretary, General António Guterres, has a clarion call for all: “On International Women’s Day, let us all pledge to do everything we can to overcome entrenched prejudice, support engagement and activism, and promote gender equality and women’s empowerment.”

Ephraim Ncube (pictured) is a youth advocate who has been empowered through the Asikhulume/ Ngatitaure/ Let’s Talk programme. He shares how his life has been transformed.

 

Ephraim Ncube

“Previously, strolling the streets, involvement in political campaigns and abusing drugs was the story of my life. I did not see myself making any difference in my community. The Asikhulume programme made me realise my self-worth and that although I regarded myself as a nonentity, I had the power to impact my village, district – and the nation at large – by contributing to policymaking initiatives. This programme has empowered me as a young person and provided me with knowledge on the Constitution of Zimbabwe, particularly Chapter 2 paragraph II, which covers the declaration of human rights and freedom.

Asikhulume is a youth-led social accountability programme based on three pillars: the right to access to health; the right to education; and lastly the right to social protection. The youth champions in Change Ward, Hwange district, have come up with their own initiative to support their advocacy work for schools and hospitals to be built, as local people are walking long distances to access these services. As youth champions, they have come together to resolve these issues within their ward and built a fowl run with 26 chickens, each contributed by a youth champion.

Ignorance and death can be one and the same but today, a once-dead community in Hwange district has risen. The entry of the SAfAIDS Asikhulume programme, working through Buwalo Matalikilo Trust (BMT), has awoken the community by providing them with information on the Zimbabwe Constitution and showing them that it is their ‘Bible’ as far as their rights are concerned. Tritchard Ncube views the Zimbabwe Constitution as a vital major friend and the community’s daily bread.  

By Elizabeth Ndhlovu-Dumbreni

SAfAIDS Changing The River’s Flow for Young People (CTRF4YP) programme has been helping shape and transform young people’s lives for the better. One such case is that of Primrose Munetsi (not her real name), an adolescent who, through the intervention of the CTRF4YP youth champions, was able to quit smoking marijuana and begin to transform her life by making the most of her time.

SAfAIDS will soon be implementing a new Sweden-funded regional programme, Transforming Lives, with a strong social accountability component.  SAfAIDS Media team leader, Tariro Makanga-Chikumbirike (TMC), interviewed Juliet Mkaronda (JM), Head of Regional Programmes, to shed light on the new programme.

 

 

 

By Elizabeth Ndhlovu-Dumbreni

Twenty-six year old Thompson Maseko from Bubi District, who has been with the SAfAIDS Asikhulume/ Ngatitaure/ Let’s Talk programme since its inception in Matabeleland North early last year, says he has since mastered the art of eloquent speaking, as well as engaging in dialogue that yields fruitful results. This comes in the wake of at least 42 children attaining birth certificates as a result of programme members’ intervention and participation.

Through recent social accountability monitoring with support from Save the Children Sweden, SAfAIDS Zambia has gathered evidence that systematic poor public resource management is a major cause of limited access to adolescent sexual and reproductive health (SRH) services in the country. This is a result of limited knowledge and skills among the duty bearers in appreciating that delivery of SRH services is their obligation. In turn, this is aggravated by limited advocacy and social accountability knowledge and skills on the part of adolescents  and young people, and their inability to hold duty bearers to account about the services they provide.

SAfAIDS Zambia is making steady progress in building the capacity of adolescents and young people so that they can hold policy makers and budget holders to account in allocating adequate resources to sexual and reproductive health (SRH) services for adolescent girls and young people. SAfAIDS Tariro Makanga-Chikumbirike (TMC) had a one-on-one with SAfAIDS Zambia Country Representative, Chrispin Chomba (CC), to shed more light on their work on social accountability.

Desire Ncube is a young woman aged 31. In 2017, she trained as a Youth Champion under the SAfAIDS Asikhulume, Ngatitaure, Let’s Talk project. As a young person, she is bold and unafraid to speak out on behalf of other young people and is also chairperson of the School Development Committee of her local primary school. This is an indication of her dedication to community development and of how well she is perceived in her community.