By Chilungamo Missi

Blantyre, September 1, Mana: Women’s Legal Resource Centre (WOLREC) drilled community members in Group Village Head Bwanasompho’s area in Blantyre on Gender-Based Violence (GBV) and referral systems to promote GBV cases reporting to relevant law enforcers and authorities.

WORLEC is carrying out series of community sensitisations on GBV in the district under a UN Women funded project called Cure GBV, targeting Tropical Cyclone Freddy survivors and service providers.

Speaking during the community sensitisation on Thursday, WORLEC Project Officer, Ernest Mujavo expressed concern that many people in rural areas fail to report on GBV cases to relevant authorities saying the reluctance victimize a lot people during disasters.

“We are doing community sensitisations on GBV and referral system targeting Tropical Cyclone Freddy survivors. A lot of GBV has happened but the challenge was that survivors were not being referred to relevant service providers to get support,” he said.

Mujayo said WORLEC has engaged service providers from Social Welfare Office, Malawi Police, Gender Officer, Judiciary and others to give communities at Bwanasompho better clarification and ways in dealing with cases of GBV in the area.

He further said WORLEC’s intention is to strengthen the referral system pathways which will empower community members to know where and to whom to report GBV cases, adding WORLEC will also ensure that the service providers have the capacity to handle GBV cases at community and district levels.

Chairperson of Village Civil Protection Committee at Bwanasompho, Esmy Kapendo hailed the WORLEC for sensitising the community members on GBV saying there was need to educate them on GBV to address the problem in rural areas where the malpractice is common.

In his remarks, Group Village head, Bwanasompho said he will take an active role in fighting GBV along with village level structures and subjects to ensure the malpractice is eradicated in his area

He urged WORLEC and other human rights organisations to continue engaging them on GBV and other human rights issues to raise much needed awareness.

Mana/cm/ewc/sbn