In 2020, communities in Karonga North constituency embarked on a fight against gender-based violence (GBV).
The Timazge Nkhaza project, which phased out in December 2024 has helped tackle cultural practices that disproportionately victimise women and girls.
The Catholic Commission for Peace and Justice received funding from Norwegian Church Aid and DanChurch Aid for mobile courts, GBV awareness rallies and vocational training for GBV survivors.
Community leaders are delighted that the interventions helped them to identify, prevent and report all forms of GBV.
“The project has borne fruit,” says group village head Mwandambo in Traditional Authority (T/A) Mwakaboko. “In our border zone, GBV perpetrators often flee to Tanzania. However, we have established ways to report GBV and track them down.”
He commended the mobile courts for taking justice closer to people, especially victimised women and children who cannot afford long travels to the nearest courtrooms.
The court circuits helped popularise GBV laws while empowering complainants to seek justice near their homes.
The winners included abandoned mothers who claimed child support from runaway men and sexual assault survivors at risk of discarding their cases due to extra costs and a climate of fear.
Recently, CCJP convened envoys from Karonga District Council and Civil Society Network to learn from the initiative.
They saluted traditional leaders such as Mwandambo for implementing community by-laws to eliminate GBV.
The localised regulations outlaw harmful traditions such as kupimbira in which some parents marry off underage girls as collateral for debts.
They prescribe a K50 000 fine for the practice which reduces girls to sex objects as they quit school for forced marriage.
Ngisi Primary School mother group secretary Tumpe Kanjere says like kupimbira, child marriages and teen pregnancies are falling in the area.
Last year, her group rescued two girls and a boy from child marriage.
“The three have returned to school,” she says. “We also saved six children trafficked to Tanzania.”
Their counterpart at Chikutu Primary School in T/A Kilupula rescued and re-enrolled 12 girls aged 13 to 15.
Kilupula child protection worker Mabvuto Shoghe says the area registered seven child trafficking cases in 2023 and none last year.
“However, we recorded 147 GBV cases and withdrew four girls from child marriages,” he said.
Two 15-year-old girls from Chikutu were impregnated at 14 by men more aged almost triple
After parents forced the girs to marry by her parents, one endured beating, bullying, starvation and deprivation, which swayed her to walk away from the marriage and re-enrol in school as advised by mother group members.
“Marriage was like imprisonment with hard labour.” “I’m happy that the concerned mothers swiftly came to my rescue, she says.
At Ngana in T/A Mwakaboko, 19-year-old Laurent Mbukwa was trafficked to a coal mine in Chunya, Tanzania.
He says the agent promised heaven on earth, but hell broke loose in the coal-rich hills.
“He promised a well-paying job, but dumped me at a coal mine where I worked in tough conditions for a month without pay,” recalls the survivor.
Mbukwa, now at Kalulu Primary School, hopes to piece together his lost time and become a teacher.
Karonga Civil Society Network chairperson Edgar Phiri says the trip helped the activists appreciate the progress and learn from CCJP strides.
“There is unity in strength,” he said. “The achievement of these strides lies in collaboration, teamwork, coordination and vibrant local reporting mechanisms,” he observes.
CCJP gender officer Stella Zimba Wella says the participatory project has empowered community members and leaders to tackle GBV head-on.
CCJP, a social justice arm of the Episcopal Conference of Malawi, partnered with the Technical, Entrepreneurial and Vocational Education and Training Authority to drill 20 GBV survivors in tailoring and knitting and motorcycle mechanics for sustainable livelihoods.
Karonga district gender officer Ireen Mwenelupembe says CCJP has strengthened the local community’s capacity to identify, prevent and report GBV.
“Last year, my office received over 957 GBV cases from women and 287 reported by men,” she says.
The Gender Equality Act and National Gender Policy prohibit GBV as an infringement of the rights, social well-being and economic growth of women and girls.
The policy promotes efforts and investments to reduce poverty and dependency which expose women and vulnerable groups to GBV.
It encourages economic empowerment initiatives to accelerate the fight against GBV, child abuse and human trafficking.
