Moravian Humanitarian and Development Services is set to implement a project to empower women and engage men to end gender-based violence (GBV) through faith and community engagement in Dowa District.
The organisation’s manager Belinda Mzembe said the project will promote gender-equitable attitudes, faith-based prevention, empowering women and girls to protect themselves from violence and engage men and boys as active partners in prevention efforts.
She said: “The project will strengthen the capacity of 40 faith leaders, engage 150 men and boys, empower 150 adolescent girls and young women from Dzaleka Refugee Camp, improve access to survivor support services and provide safe spaces and basic psychosocial support for girls and young women.”
Mzembe said the organisation decided to extend the project to host communities after observing that most GBV programmes primarily targeted women.
She said: “We saw a need because most programmes were targeting women. Since we were also working in Dzaleka, we thought of extending the project to the host communities and engaging men.
“We have also discovered that many people turn to faith leaders when faced with challenges.”
Dowa District Council director of planning and development Phillimon Maseko welcomed the initiative, saying there was a need for such a project due to the high number of GBV cases reported in the district.
“This is the right time to step up efforts to stop the vice,” he said.
