MANAonline
70 percent of children faced with poverty
By Leonard Masauli
Lilongwe, May 15 (Mana): Latest Report on Child Multidimensional Poverty, compiled by United Nations Children Fund (UNICEF), National Statistical Office (NSO) and National Planning Commission (NPC) has revealed that that 70 percent of children in the country face various forms of poverty.
The Report was presented at Bingu International Convention Centre (BICC) in Lilongwe on Wednesday during a presentation of the Report on Child Multidimensional Poverty in the country.
The Report has highlighted that children in the country are deprived of good sanitation, housing, education, nutrition, health, and protection, all of which threaten their chances of becoming productive citizens in the future.
Commissioner of Statistics, Shelton Kanyanda stated that the report focused on the deprivation of children, indicating that over 70 percent of children in country are multidimensionally poor.
“The main driver of the poverty rate we are seeing today is the issue of sanitation. It seems sanitation is a challenge in most households, followed by education and housing. These factors are pushing more children into poverty.
“The Report calls for more intervention from stakeholders. The multidimensional approach is beneficial as it highlights specific areas needing attention. If sanitation is a challenge, we can quickly call on policymakers to address these issues,” he pointed out.
Kanyanda emphasized that it was time for the country to shift its focus from poverty reduction to wealth creation.
Principal Secretary for Economic Planning and Development, Patrick Zimpita mentioned that the government has outlined several focus areas, such as those in the National Youth Policy 2023.
This policy includes interventions like retaining girls in school and implementing child feeding programmes.
“This report is extremely important because, in the past, we focused on Growth Domestic Product (GDP) growth. However, if you say the economy has grown by three percent, does that reflect an improvement in people’s lives?
“We should not rely solely on monetary indicators like GDP numbers. We must understand the dynamics of the country's growth to ensure that no one, especially children, is left behind. The government will introduce necessary interventions,” Zimpita said.
UNICEF Representative in Malawi, Shadrick Omol commended government for the Report, noting that it would help stimulate interventions and policy decisions.
The Report indicates that central region has the highest number of multidimensionally poor children, followed by southern region, and then northern region.
Communities to access tapped water
By Vincent Khonje
Mchinji, May 15, Mana: Communities of Group Village Head, Wirima in the area of Traditional Authority (TA) Gumba in Mchinji District have for the first time in their lives gained access to tapped water.
Previously, the lack of potable water forced the communities to rely on unsafe boreholes and shallow wells, leading to frequent waterborne diseases.
Speaking on Tuesday when Source of Life Children Foundation handed over a solar-powered water system to the village, the Organization’s Country Representative, Innocent Semu said they thought of going to the area because people have never enjoyed potable water for a long time.
“Finding safe water has been a challenge for the people over the past 50 years and they were forced to get water from wells where they shared the water with animals,
“We have brought in safe water to the community where they will be getting the water from the taps which is convenient to them,” he pointed out.
A community member, Stella Grey said she used to wake up at 4 am to be first to get to a well, but the wells usually dried up.
“The shallow wells in the Village are a source of diseases because they are not well protected and our children used to often get sick. I am happy to see tapped water in our village for the first time,” she explained.
Commenting on waterborne diseases and unavailability of safe water, Senior Disease Control and Surveillance Officer under Gumba Health Centre, Allan Banda said there was only one borehole in the area which makes waterborne diseases to rise.
“As a result of poor water sources, 10 Dysentery cases are registered in children under the age of five. We are hopeful the situation will change now,” he hoped.
TA Gumba was all praises of the development in her area.
“I am very happy with the water system in this area and will make sure the community take care of it,” she said.
Source of Life Children Foundation is a child-focused Christian Not-for-profit organization and apart from water and sanitation, it works in the area of climate change, education, women empowerment and permaculture among others.
Temporary closer of registration exercise
By Patience Longwe
Lilongwe, May 15, Mana: National Registration Bureau (NRB) has said the implementation of phase 8 of the Identity Cards (ID) Outreach and Community Death Registration exercise would be temporarily closed for three days to pave way for the administration of Primary School Leaving Certificate of Education (PSLCE) examinations.
Principal Secretary for NRB, Mark Sambo confirmed the development to Malawi News Agency (mana) in Lilongwe on Wednesday saying the decision has been made to give chance to the standard eight pupils to sit for their examinations in peaceful and suitable environment.
"The three-day break aims at providing an opportunity standard eight pupils to sit for their examinations without any disturbances," he viewed.
Sambo said the examinations are expected to start on May 22, 2024.
A Primary school teacher at Kawale LEA, Martha Msusa has said the decision to go for break would help the learners to write their exams without disturbances.
"This will help the Malawi National Examination Board (MANEB) not to have any doubts because of the peaceful environment.
NRB will restart the registration exercise on May 25, 2024 after the examination.
Girls education support under threat
By Rose Cross
Mzuzu, May 15, Mana: Despite efforts to promote girls’ education and empowerment in the country, child marriages and early pregnancies continue slowing down and counteracting efforts in promoting girls’ education.
Random interviews with different institutions, including some youth in Mzimba North and Mzuzu City have revealed that some of the factors fueling early marriages and teen pregnancies include high poverty levels, limited access to Sexual Reproductive Health Rights (SRH) Services and poor parental support.
A young bride, Salomy Jere who got pregnant soon after enrolling for her first year in college at the age of 17, argued that there was need for increased access to SRHR education and services to enable young people, including girls to have an option to protect themselves from such sexual mishaps.
“When I got pregnant, I lived in regret and couldn’t go back home to my mother who is a single parent; as such I had to get married. I didn’t plan on getting pregnant but doing sex for fun made it happen.
“I believe if there can be intensive education on SRHR, situations like what I went through can be limited,” Jere said, holder of Diploma in Business Management.
Executive Director for Citizen Impact Organisation (CIO), Chimwemwe Banda concurred with Jere, saying most parents and guardians do not open up to their girl children on sexual relationship issues such that girls get either incomplete or wrong information from peers and some people who advance for them.
“Aside creating more spaces for girls to access sexual reproductive health services, girls need information for them to be empowered to them to have self- esteem so that they request or access the services as their right.
“The issue of child marriages is directly connected to early pregnancies because most girls who enter into early marriage are forced into it after falling pregnant,” she said, whose organization was establishing community hubs where girls who are withdrawn from marriages meet and send back to school.
Founder and Director for Uchembere Wabwino, a Reproductive Health Facility in the heart of Mzuzu City, Lucy Msukwa acknowledged that teen pregnancy was a challenge which shouldn’t be ignored by government and stakeholders if girl education and empowerment was to be achieved.
She disclosed that the facility treats a minimum of three cases related to teen pregnancies each week, a development that forced the organisation to introduce “Uchembere Youth for Change”, a youth outreach programme which engages secondary school going youth on SRH services.
“Through the initiative, we go to secondary schools and interface students on the importance of abstinence and dangers of teen pregnancies among others. We also discuss with them various entrepreneurial skills such as making floor polish from recycled plastics and fire briquettes.
“Aside intensifying health education provision to the youths, there is also need to create more flexible health care tools and procedures so that health facilities and workers are accommodative to youths,” Msukwa added.
She observed that a lot still needs to be done by both government and non-state actors in censoring SRH information which was meant for the youth consumption.
“I feel information should center more on the preventive side other than concentrating on contraceptives which brings more complications when not properly used,” the Director said.
Amidst challenges of limited information and access to SRH services, Executive Director for Judith Foundation, an institution which offers education bursary schemes to secondary school girls in Mzimba North District, Judith Chbambo discovered that girls need formal education to beat financial woes affecting their respective homes.
“A girl who does not know her rights will continuously be a victim of abuse including being sent into early marriage.
“There is need for the girls to be provided with formal education so that they can voice out their concerns and beat poverty,” she noted.
Chibambo acknowledged that the fight is not only to prevent teen pregnancies, but to restore the honor of those who were already been defiled.
“While preventing teen girls from getting pregnant is the main goal, we should not leave behind those who fell pregnant and this is why as an organization, we are supporting those who were once pregnant to go back to school.
“We need to be there to tell them that all is not lost,” she said.
Chibambo was optimistic that consolidated efforts in implementing initiatives that encourage girl education are the way to go.
“It is true that teen pregnancies and early marriages are affecting the outcome of our efforts in fostering girl education since when a beneficiary drops out, we need to find a replacement and such expenses are difficult to justify to donors.
“We always look at the brighter side of this all. If we work together and intensify efforts to reduce and indeed curb such pregnancies, there will be no school dropout; at the same time, we feel the gaps created by drop outs can be filled by those that are re-admitted after delivering their child,” she added.
District Youth Officer (DYO) for Mzimba North and responsible for Mzuzu City, Misheck Msokwa said his office was scaling up civic education activities as a way of ensuring that young girls are get necessary information for them to develop into their full potential.
“We are aware that some of these challenges are escalated by harmful cultural practices which are exposse young girls to early sexual activities. We are working with community youth hubs so that we reaching out too, to many youths with information on the dangers of indulging in early sexual activities.
“We are working with stakeholders to provide various skills to youths as a means of reducing their financial challenges which are some of the drivers of such practices,” he said.
Recently, Deputy Minister of Health, Halima Daudi disclosed that cases of teenage pregnancies are at 29 percent.
She urged stakeholders to reflect on potential factors influencing such incidents in different parts of the country.
Daudi was speaking during the launching ceremony of a Faith Based Approach to SRHR sexual at Ntaja in Machinga District.
Council ready to roll-out UBR second phase
By Andrew Mkonda
Lilongwe, May 15, Mana: Lilongwe District Council Principal Social Welfare Officer, Sarah Chimodzi has said the district was ready to roll-out the second phase of Unified Beneficiary Registry (UBR) exercise.
In an interview on Monday in Lilongwe, she said the exercise that was expected to start on May 20, 2024 and run for 25 days, would cover the five remaining Traditional Authorities (TAs) that were not covered in the first phase that took place in February, 2024.
“We are supposed to reach out to 439,249 households as our target, but we only managed to reach out to 358, 794 due to the vastness of the district, but this time around, we are optimistic that we will cover the remaining 80, 455 households,” Chimodzi she said.
She disclosed that 160 enumerators from 460 enumerators that were recruited in the first phase are expected to be engaged in the exercise and would be covering 25 households per day.
“I am happy that these enumerators gave us the correct data in the first phase that really represented the real status of households on the ground, and we are optimistic that they will continue giving us accurate data in this phase,” she said.
Lilongwe District Council Chairperson, Dan Mtayamanja thanked government for continuing with the exercise in the district for the remaining TAs, saying it would assist in knowing the social economic status of the people in the district.
He said UBR information was very important because it provides the district with consolidated information on the social-economic status of households which would assist in determining people’s opportunity of being in different programmes such as Social Cash Transfer and Climate Smart Public Works Programme.
The remaining TAs in Lilongwe includes Kalolo, Tsabango, Msinde, Kachule, and Kalumba.
A Similar exercise was conducted in Blantyre, Kasungu and Rumphi.
New teacher’s house motivates community
By Aliko Munde
Chitipa, May 15, Mana: Traditional leaders surrounding Kavomolo Primary School in the area of Senior Chief Mwenewenya in Chitipa have applauded Governance to Enable Service Delivery (GESD) for funding a K30 million teacher's house construction project at the school.
In an interview on Wednesday in Chitipa, Group Village Head (GVH) Mwenenyimbiri said some teachers were walking long distances to and from the school due to shortage of teacher's houses at the institution.
He said that the teachers who were staying in rented houses were reporting for duties late thereby compromising their performance.
“Apart from easing the shortage of teacher's houses at the school, the house has also added beauty to the area,” Mwenenyimbiri said.
Head Teacher for the school, Peter Munkhondia thanked Chitipa District Council for constructing the teacher's house which was is a motivation to teachers.
“We have a shortage of teachers’ houses here but with the construction of this house we are motivated and teaching is now becoming exciting,” he observed.
Director of Education, Youth and Sports for Chitipa District Council, Clement Nyirenda said that one of the factors that was lacking in public institutions such as schools is accommodation.
“The Council and its partners are able to build school blocks, forgetting teachers’ houses and this makes it hard for us to deploy teachers to in rural areas,” he said.
Nyirenda said that if the council and partners continue building more houses, the issue of equitable distribution of teachers would be achieved.
GESD is funded by the World Bank, which is aimed at strengthening local authorities’ performance, responsiveness to citizens’ needs and management of resources for improved service delivery.
Reformatory Centre to receive firewood
By Vida Msiyo
Blantyre, May 15, Mana: Nankumba Community Based Organization (CBO) at Mbame in Blantyre will shortly donate firewood to Mpemba Reformatory Centre in the district after observing that the Centre was in dire need of firewood for cooking.
Nankumba CBO Chairperson, John Machika disclosed this to Malawi News Agency (Mana) on Wednesday in Blantyre saying the CBO saw it crucial to donate the firewood to support the welfare of young individuals whom he said need well prepared meals in the course of reformation for the better future.
“Our goal has always been to support our community and reduce burdens wherever possible. We saw it fit to compliment government’s effort in providing resources for the center,” he added,
Nankumba CBO which boasts 10,000 mature trees in their woodlot, intends to donate more than 1 tonne of firewood to Mpemba Reformatory Center in due course.
“With our woodlot, we now boast about 10,000 mature trees and this is why we are ready to reach out to various sectors within our community. We observed frequent appeals for firewood in schools that often request K200 contributions from parents for School Feeding Programme,” he added.
Machika said Nankumba CBO was compelled to step in after learning that there was shortage of firewood at Mpemba Reformatory Centre whose need for firewood was similar to all other schools at Mpemba/Mbame area.
“The firewood is ready but our primary requirement is transportation to deliver the firewood to Mpemba Reformatory Centre,” he added.
A Community member, James Chabwera hailed the CBO for wishing to provide the firewood to the Centre.
He said this would help to reduce their spending on firewood needs.
The CBO was established in 2015, dedicated to serve the community at TA Somba through various community level interventions such as child care and other vulnerable section of the society.
ILLOVO donates patrol equipment
By Wongani Mkandawire.
Nkhotakota, May 15, Mana: Illovo Sugar Company in Nkhotakota has donated patrol equipment to Gwinthi Crime Prevention Panel in Dwangwa.
At the hand-over ceremony, Illovo Sugar Company Community Policing Coordinator, Martin Malisawa advised the CPP members to be a united team and secure people and property within their locality.
"Be like a bunch that no one breaks, it is the wish of the company to make sure that communities around the Estate's sugar fields are well-secured. It is only when people are well-secured that they have time for developmental activities," he said
Malisawa said patrols should be scaring people with evil intentions in the sugarcane fields.
He encouraged them all, not to hesitate arresting whoever is found stealing or selling the Illovo sugarcane.
The Company Coordinator assured the people that the company realizes its corporate responsibility and that communities living around the estate should be supported.
Group Village Head (GVH), Gwinthi thanked Illovo Sugar Company for such a gesture.
"These people have worked as community policing members for a long time guarding and patrolling sugarcane fields for local farmers. There was no benefit either for the community or themselves.
“With your coming as Illovo sugar company, we have already started noting the fruits and we appreciate, you are a friend indeed," he said.
Gwinthi pledged total support and to ensure that men are always watchful.
Community Policing Coordinator for Nkhunga Police Station, Sub Inspector, Patrick Mwale advised the CPP members to work professionally when discharging their duties.
He warned them never to betray one another or start wrangles because of the equipment but to unite and develop teamwork for the benefit of their own community.
The equipment includes one hunter pedal bicycle, 10 pairs of gumboots, 10 reflective vests, one rechargeable torch, and whistles are worth K500,000.00.
Market shed improves livelihoods
By Sylvester Kumwenda
Dowa, May 15, Mana: Small scale business entrepreneurs at Bowe in Traditional Authority (TA) Chakhaza in Dowa have said the construction of Bowe market shed by Dowa district Council under the Governance to Enable Service Delivery (GESD) has improved businesses at the market and their livelihoods.
A Tomato business lady from Kachenga Village, Judith Banda said initially, they used to sell from grass thatched makeshift structures which was a challenge.
“Hygiene was a problem. There were risks of fires because of the grass. When it rained, we used to halt our businesses and run for shelter. This heavily affected our income because if you made little or no sales meant you would not have food.
“But the with this shed, we can sell the whole day without any disturbances which is good for business and in sustaining our daily livelihoods,” she said.
A Fish Seller from Mwalala Village, Joseph Cosmas said his sales have improved.
He said he used to make less than K20,000 a day but since moving into the shed which has been constructed to a tune of K 35 million, he makes around K30,000 and on a good day he can hit K40,000.
“This has helped me as I can now provide for my family with livelihood needs like sugar, soap, and clothes,” Cosmas said.
The Shed which was constructed alongside a VIP toilet contains lockers which he said provide both safety and storage space for their goods.
“Fish are easily perishable goods and rot easily once drenched in water. This made us lose especially during rainy seasons. But I can now safely keep the fish in lockers, and we no longer carry our goods to and from home on daily basis,” he said.
Chairperson of Bowe Market, Kondwani Wasitino thanked GESD project which is being implemented by the National Local Government Finance Committee in councils with funding from the World Bank.
He said as a market committee, they are enforcing ticket sales amongst traders which he said was contributing to the council’s income generation activities.
Under GESD, Councils are funded for developmental activities based on their Local Assembly Performance Assessment.
Primary schools to benefit from MERP
By Tracy Mtegha
Mzuzu, May 15, Mana: Malawi Education Reform Programme (MERP) intends to construct 10, 900 school blocks in primary schools in Mzuzu and across the country in order to provide conducive teaching and learning environment
In an interview on Tuesday in Mzuzu, Construction Desk Officer for the programme, Perhaps Nyungu said construction of the blocks were already under progress in Mzuzu City targeting 24 schools with a block each.
“We borrowed this concept from Malawi Education School Improvement Plan (MESIP) and currently construction 10 school blocks are under construction in Mzuzu City.
This initiative was hatched as a solution to high learner classroom ratio between Standard 1 to 4 so that we create conducive learning environment thereby enhancing the interest in learners to go to school,” he said.
Shift Y Head Teacher at Chiputula Primary School in Mzuzu, Mazganga Banda said the project would reduce congestion of learners in classrooms.
“We have 3,460 learners and 56 teachers which means one teacher serves 70 to 80 learners in a class, yet we are supposed to have at least 60 learners for one teacher,” he said.
A Standard 8 learner at the school, Modester Chikwanje applauded government for the project saying the initiative would boost the learners’ interest in education.
“As a leaner, I will make sure that I take care of the classrooms for it is a privilege to us, as beneficiaries of this project,” she promised.
Some of the schools which have already benefited from the program in Mzuzu City include, Geisha, Zolozolo, Kawuwa, Chiputula, Katoto and Ching’ambo
The Project started in March 2022 with financial support from World Bank and is expected to be finished December 2025
