Irish Aid CSF Program - UWAMA Project Report
JULY, 20122 – FEBRUARY, 2012
OVERVIEW
PROJECT NAME: Ufulu wa Amai (UWAMA) Project
NAME OF IMPLEMENTING ORGANISATION: ActionAid International Malawi
COUNTRY: Malawi
REPORTING PERIOD: July, 2011 – February, 2012
PROJECT YEAR: One
IMPLEMENTING DISTRICTS: Rumphi, Karonga, Chitipa, Salima and Chiradzulu
IMPLEMENTING PARTNERS: Women Forum, Salima Women’s Network on Gender & Justice Link
REPORTING DATE: February, 2012
INTRODUCTION
ActionAid International Malawi has been implementing an Irish Aid Civil Society Funded Program since September, 2006. Implementation of the Project called Social Empowerment on Rights for Vulnerable and Excluded Women (SERVE) was concluded in December, 2010 and it saw the formation of another Women’s Rights Project called Ufulu wa Amai (UWAMA) that commenced in July, 2011.
Implementation of UWAMA project started at a high note with national, district level and stakeholder project awareness workshops that started with the Ministry of Gender at national level which is a mandatory body on women’s issues. The District Executive Committee (DEC) meetings followed in all the five implementing districts where various government departments and NGOs working in the districts were briefed on project intentions as well as consulted on selection of Traditional Areas that will benefit from the Project. The following criteria were followed; rising cases of Violence against Women and Girls occurring in the T.As and also whether the T.As were already benefiting from similar interventions. Following these meetings, DEC members endorsed all the selected 15 T.As. Area Development Committees (ADC) meetings followed in 15 T.As where the committees were also oriented on project intentions. One exciting thing about the project start up was the embracing of experiences and lessons from the previous program which enabled the project to realistically position itself to address the real issue that women are facing, and is promising great success, change and impact on the lives of many vulnerable women and girls in the implementing focus areas which are 15 Traditional Authorities.
This report therefore gives a highlight on project implementation from July, 2011 to February, 2012. Amongst other things the report will focus on Progress made on implementation of activities, achievements, lessons learn, challenges encountered as well as how the project in contributing project’s contribution to a broader international and National Goal of attaining gender equality.
PROJECT DESCRIPTION
Ufulu wa Amai (UWAMA) project intends to enhance the reduction of incidences of Violence against Women and girls (VAW) by enabling women and girls to understand and claim their rights through raising their awareness on provisions of the available women’s rights legal framework, improving their access to justice in the face of violation of their rights, improving their economic status and strengthening the women’s movement at local and national level. The project is being implemented in five districts with a specific focus in 15 Traditional Authority Areas (T.A) namely Chitipa (T.As Misiku, Kameme & Wenya), Rumphi (Sub T.As Chisovya, Njikura and Mwahenga) Karonga (T.As Mwilang’ombe, Kyungu and Kilupula), Salima (T.As Pemba, Kandulu and Ndindi) and Chiradzulu (T.As Mpama 2, Likoswe and Ntchema). UWAMA project was developed through lessons, challenges as well as gaps that were drawn from the Social Empowerment on Rights for Vulnerable and Excluded Women (SERVE) project. The end of project evaluation report for SERVE project also informed the conception of UWAMA Project. The project essentially intends to address two core issues;
· Thriving incidences of Violence against Women and the girl child where awareness of women and girls legal rights fairy exists among women but not the general public and access to redress mechanisms and justice is still an issue due to a number of challenges the formal and informal justice system is currently facing.
· Economic disempowerment of women which makes them vulnerable to violence.
Project Broader Goal: To develop communities where all women and girls have the opportunity to realize their social, economic and political rights to be able to demand their space from those in power to fully participate in the community and national development agenda.
Project Objectives
· To promote easy and timely access to justice for female victims of justice.
· To promote and protect women’s rights by raising awareness of rights holders(women, community leaders, youth, men) on the WR legal frameworks and legal implications for its violations.
· Women’s groups strengthened to effectively plan, campaign, and participate in policy-making processes to support women’s rights at national level.
· Improve women and girls’ economic status by building their skills in Village Savings and Loans Associations, business management and linking them to markets.
Target Population
UWAMA project intends to reach out to a population of not less than 4,200 where 3,000 will be women and 1,200 men. The direct target groups for the project are vulnerable women and girls primarily and duty bearers who have a role to play in promoting and protecting women’s rights and these include chiefs, men, boys, police, judiciary and other stakeholders.
PROGRESS AGAINST OBJECTIVES - Major Achievements in this phase
Objective 1: To promote easy and timely access to justice for female victims of violence
1.1. Project Launch
In the first three months of implementation, the Project team managed to carry out stakeholder project briefing meetings at local and national level. This was done with the purpose of introducing the project intentions to key stakeholders in the project for their support as well as seeking input on how best the project can be implemented in various districts and communities in order to achieve the intended purpose. At national level, the project was introduced to the Ministry of Gender where the audience comprised of the Director of Gender, Deputy Director of Gender and 3 Program Officers for Gender. The ministry endorsed the Project intentions and pledged to support implementation of the same sighting that the project was a timely intervention considering challenges that women are still facing in accessing justice and attaining economic independence especially in the rural areas. Following this national level meeting, 5 other meetings followed at district level (one in each of the 5 districts) and 15 Area Development Committee (ADC) level meetings where a total of 114 DEC members and 320 ADC members were reached. The stakeholders provided us with concrete feedback and pledged their support to the implementation of the Project.
1.2. Baseline Survey & Dissemination
A baseline survey for the project was conducted from November to December, 2012 with the aim of establishing benchmarks as a measure of comparison for determining program success at the end of implementation but also to determine the status of issues on ground that the project intends to address which is critical in designing various project strategies for the project. The baseline Survey was successfully done and the findings were shared at both local and national level targeting the Ministry of Gender, District Executive committees in 3 districts, AAIM staff and Partners. The survey report surfaced other critical issues that were initially not incorporated in the project design like the issue of education (literacy levels) being key in implementation of women’s rights issues and lack of factual awareness where a majority of the respondents both men and women failed to assert examples of rights that they have as human beings.
The Survey has so far informed a Communication and Advocacy Strategy that is currently being developed for the Project.
1.3. Production of a translated and simplified Version of Women’s Rights Legal Framework
Developing and translating a Simplified Version of selected laws that Protect and Promote Women’s Rights .In an effort to increase public awareness on laws and policies that protect and promote women’s rights in the country, UWAMA project in collaboration with Justice Link and in consultation with the Ministry of Gender have developed a simplified version of four selected laws that are; the Prevention of Domestic Violence Act, the Wills and Inheritance Act, The Child Protection and Justice Act with a focus on affiliation and the Women’s Constitutional Rights an extraction from the Constitution of Malawi. The selection of the laws was done in consultation with the Ministry of Gender, the Law Commission, Malawi Law Society and the implementing partners that we work with particularly women. The simplified version has so far been translated into one local language, Chichewa and will in the next phase be further translated into Tumbuka common language for the northern region.
1.4. Budget tracking Training targeting Women Forum and District level Stakeholders
Strengthening the voice of Civil Society Organizations at district level to influence budget allocations in government departments that provide redress services to victims of violence. UWAMA project trained 51 Women and 40 members of the Civil Society organizations in the five implementing districts on Budget Monitoring and Advocacy to enable them understand the national and district level government budget development process that will facilitate their influence in budget allocation processes. The trainings were equipping participants with sufficient knowledge on National and District Budget processes, how they can channel their input into Public Budget; Monitoring methodologies, Processing, Reporting and Dissemination; Advocacy and Lobbying skills.
1.4. Women petition government to allocate adequate resources to frontline offices that provide redress services at district level. Following the successful trainings and understanding of Budget processes and Advocacy skills, Women Forums in collaboration with other civil society organizations in the five districts conducted Service Delivery Satisfactory Survey (SDSS) in order to determine how satisfied women are with redress services in a particular district focusing on four frontline offices that included Chiefs’ courts at community level, magistrate courts, police, social welfare office and the District commissioners offices at district level. The Survey informed petitions that Women Forums as rights holders and other Civil Society organizations presented to the named offices demanding quality, timely and speedy service delivery at all levels. Amongst other concerns raised in the petitions included; delayed arrests where the Women Forums and other Human Rights Organization at district level report cases of violence to police but the police takes long to respond, the women further reported that some officers in the government departments demand fees for police officers or courts to process victims’ cases, some officers demand transport, lunch and at times stationery from victims claiming that is the only way for their cases to be addressed speedily. Inadequate staff in the offices was also a concern which results in delayed response to cases. The petitions went further to request the respective frontline offices to budget for adequate funds in the 2012/13 budgets to hasten quality and effective service delivery to those seeking remedy.
This exercise served as the voice of the women as rights holders to courts, police, social welfare and district councils as duty bearers advocating for adequate allocation of funds and quality service delivery.
The women further requested these offices to be conducting annual or periodic budget consultations and hearings with them as is the right procedure in public budgeting which is not happening in most of the districts as is expected. These consultations will give the women the much needed opportunity to voice out issues of concern on public services.
District commissioner for Chiradzulu positively responded that they will address their needs but also promised that they will be working together with the women. The response letter was signed by the DC himself. Similarly, the magistrates of Chitipa and Rumphi responded positively. Follow ups will be made on these commitments in the next phase.
Currently our partner Justice Link is supporting Women Forums to conduct Public Expenditure Tracking Survey (PETS) in all the five implementing districts to monitor how much funds these offices were allocated, actual funds received and how these funds were utilThis exercise is also looking at whether the resources both human and financial were adequate or not for them to implement the activities lined up in the 2011/ 2012 fiscal year. The survey findings will inform our advocacy interventions in the next phase.
1.5. Communication & Advocacy Strategy Development
UWAMA project with support from the Advocacy and Campaigns Coordination office brought together partners and stakeholders from the five implementing districts as well as other national level GBV stakeholders that included Malawi Human Rights Resource Centre (MHRRC), Women’s legal Resource Centre, NGO Gender Coordination Network (NGO GCN), Catholic Commission for Justice and peace (CCJP) , Women Forum and Oxfam that went through a process of identifying advocacy issues within the Project’s Women’s Access to Justice agenda and plan for advocacy interventions from the issues identified. The three days workshop took the participants through a deeper analysis of “denied and delayed access to justice by rural women”, identifying the root causes to the issue and possible interventions. Three major issues were identified as follows;
· Inadequate financial and human resource for the formal justice delivery systems to be accessible to women and girls. (Paralegal representation in the informal courts, establishment of Community Legal Mediators.
· Little or no enforcement of judgments – this disadvantages Women and girls; loss of trust & confidence in the judicial system. (e.g. maintenance).
· Lack of awareness on the part of women and girls on important laws and court procedures.
Advocacy Goal
Women and Girls in rural areas experiencing violence have access to efficient and effective justice by 2015.
Advocacy Objectives
a. Advocate for government to integrate paralegal services and community mediators into the formal justice system by 2015
b. Advocate for increased resource allocation for operation in outreach court activities from X% - Y % by 2015
c. Advocate for government to increase number of qualified magistrates (from 30-90) and upgrade lay magistrates to improve access to justice and efficiency by 2015.
d. To facilitate creation of an environment where the majority of rural women and girls are able to demand appropriate case procedures and fair judgments by 2015.
Following this workshop a complete Advocacy working document is being developed which will not only be owned by AAIM but will enable other stakeholders with the same interest of enhancing rural women’s access to justice to be part of the advocacy initiative. Plans are underway to have a long term campaign on the same issue.
Objective 2: To promote and protect women’s rights by raising awareness targeting (women, girls community leaders, youth, men) on the WR legal frameworks and legal implications for its violations.