Archive for the ‘Uncategorized’ Category

By: myadmin • August 1, 2019

On Menstrual Hygiene Day ROOTS coincidentally was at the Dutch embassy to present our pads hamper to the Ambassador; Barbara van Hellemond. The Netherlands Embassy donated the machine that our community girls who are child brides from Shamva community use to make the pads.

This project is an innovation that is aiming to create employment creation for young people specifically child brides whilst at the same time capacitating them with skills that will empower them.

By: myadmin • August 1, 2019

The stigma around abortion is compounded by socio-cultural beliefs that has seen many women resorting to backdoor unsafe abortions due to fear of stigmatization and labelling. The Guttmacher research done in partnership with the Ministry of Health and Child Care has shown that despite the decline rate of a global trend of maternal deaths, Zimbabwe is actually on the rise because of the restrictive laws around abortion. The statistics provided  state that 66 800 abortions are induced in Zimbabwe and this translates to 18 in every 1000 abortions between the 15-49 young girls and women while 40% of the pregnancies are unintended and a quarter of these end in abortion and 1 in every 5 women who undergo unsafe abortion lose lives due to complications. The RHRN consortium has since been hosting community dialogues to gather and disseminate information on the lived realities of unsafe abortions that are happening in different provinces. Abortion is an issue that is not largely and openly discussed in the community because of the beliefs that abortion is murder and with different values and norms. However avoiding open discussion around the issue has seen a rise in maternal deaths attributed to unsafe abortion hence the need to hold dialogues to get issues from people within the community and their voices will inform our advocacy.

Under Right Here, Right Now Roots this year has been having meetings with young people and the community in general to hear about their issues around SRHR in an effort to answer key questions such as: Are they accessing services? Are there any challenges and what do they want to change? Above all, do they understand what SRHR is? ROOTS has also been having an interface meetings between service providers and young people to discuss the same issues and hearing the challenges that service delivery points have in terms of SRHR service provision.  Some of the issues discussed were sex work among young girls,unsafe abortions,teenage pregnancies and age of consent to SRH services .Members of parliament and clerks from the committee on health ,justice and women affairs attended the dialogues. The working group that is working to have the TOPA reviewed held community dialogues in Masvingo province namely in Mapanzure and Chiredzi urban. The dialogues were attended by key stakeholders from media houses, sex workers, community leaders, Min of youth , Min of Women Affairs , FACT , Child line, Councilors, NAC, CeSSHAR, Disability Zimbabwe Trust, GALA Trust , MMPZ,SME’s, Coalition Against Child Labor, CHIRA, District Administrator, VFU, Chief Mapanzure, church leaders, health workers, head men  and members from the Arts industry. Objectives of the community dialogues were as follows:

• Raise awareness on the state of abortion in Zimbabwe, injustices posed and highlight provisions within the TOPA
• To actively engage community members (including religious and traditional leaders) on the need to amend the TOPA
• To gather evidence for parliamentarians to move a motion in parliament.
• Propose recommendations for the amendment of the TOPA

Many issues emerged as a result of the discussions. Overall, there has been a disheartening situation of young girls selling sex that has been affecting communities including sex workers and the issue has been presented to parliament. Most of the young sex workers are starting as early as 10 years and usually have children at around 13 so they secure children before they get deeper in their work. Once these sex workers have their first child the other pregnancies that will come are unintended and hence are most likely to end in abortion and most of these girls are dying since they cannot pay for user fees for safe termination. Key drivers of this phenomenon includes, poverty, curiosity, child headed families, failure to pay school fees by parents, economic meltdown and lack of employment. Sexual reproductive health services are provided weekly by CESSHAR.  Some of the challenges these sex workers face include being paid via eco-cash and transactions being reversed or not being enough because of the charges, being forced to have unprotected sex and sometimes being abandoned, there is poor service provision by the police to assist sexually harassed or assaulted sex workers, there   are also issues of human trafficking, rape and labelling.

By: myadmin • August 1, 2019

With funding from VGIF a total of 4 community dialogues were held in four different locations in BINDURA district namely Bemberero, Glamorgan, Woodlands and Arcadia within the year of 2018. All of them being farming communities religiously dominated by the vapostori sect and where there is a high prevalence of Child marriage and GBV. At these dialogues, a platform was provided for the communities to define child marriage and GBV according to their viewpoints. It was apparent that all the communities understood what both subjects entailed.

Drivers of GBV and child marriages were also discussed with communities seeking to understand what caused parents to marry off their children and also how they felt about the marriage act. Mostly, economic challenges and uninformed religious practices came about as major drivers of child marriage. Also lack of SRH information leads to children indulging in unprotected sexual activities resulting in unwanted and unplanned pregnancies and then the elders in the community would recommend that the minors get married.

These discussions with the communities helped them to realize how bad the practices were. In the end they also helped in making sure that the community members became ambassadors and whistle blowers among themselves in reporting and acting against child marriages and GBV. These community dialogues also improved referral networks for girls in child marriages as these communities were now better equipped and informed to help them when it became necessary. These community dialogues left a lasting mark on these communities evidenced by a clearly new found zeal to protect girls and women from negative cultural practices.
ROOTS also facilitated counselling sessions for couples including those involved in child marriage situations, which were running at times concurrently with the community dialogues. This was done with a total of 30 couples, who were identified by the ROOTS team of facilitators as experiencing extreme GBV. In these sessions the following were covered: A brief history of their relationship, trying to focus on the happy times and why they got together. Following this they were asked to share their specific challenges and explain in their own way, why or what circumstances had gotten them to where they were. We then explored alternative conflict resolution techniques that would leave both satisfied in the long term. Communication Strategies were proposed for the couples as well as stressing the importance of a positive atmosphere in their marriages. The couples were engaged openly and were willing to make changes in their lifestyle. According to one of the counsellors in her report she notes “If ROOTS would carry on and intensify this project I am hopeful that a significant change would be realised.” The counsellors also got to meet individuals who were in the referral networks of those affected.
For many teenagers, the onset of adolescence brings not only changes to their bodies but also new vulnerabilities to human rights abuses, particularly in the areas of sexuality, marriage and childbearing. Millions of girls are coerced into unwanted sex or marriage, putting them at risk of unwanted pregnancies, unsafe abortions, sexually transmitted infections (STIs) including HIV, and dangerous childbirth. Adolescent boys are at risk, as well. These young people – both boys and girls – are disproportionately affected by HIV yet they face barriers to reproductive health information and care. The young people, particularly the girls at Maizelands secondary school in Bindura district face these challenges and ROOTS reached out to them and other young people in the local mining and farming community. ROOTS had noted with concern that child marriages are still occurring in the target area and one of the main drivers being barriers to the access to SRHR information. ROOTS then had a one day Girls wellness fair for female adolescents at maizelands secondary school and from surrounding communities and male adolescents also attended. Our partners in the health sector came and at their various stands gave AYP sexual and reproductive health information.

Based on availability of funding, ROOTS wishes to address the need for more community dialogues as they provide an outlet for usually victims to speak out openly against bad practices without fear of certain backlash that comes if they were to confront the same issues privately. The dialogues also provided an opportunity for the communities to make agreements on certain principles and future engagements would help them in maintaining the accord that they have established. The couples counselling was instrumental in allowing the low income earners to access a service that is usually for just the affluent and the sessions were also important in curbing GBV in marriages.The girl’s wellness fair showed that such a one stop resource centre would help in provision of the much needed basis SRHR information, enlightening girls about the dangers of child marriage and go a long way in motivating them to stay in school.

By: myadmin • August 1, 2019

ROOTS on the 5th of April attended the launch of Tanaka Clinic.Tanaka is a clinic for adolescence where they access SRH services seperately from adults. Its in Rushinga at Tanaka Business center. It was done by SAFAIDS with funding from Save the Children Sweden and help from Min Of Health and Child Care.
They have also established GBV 72 Hr Rooms at 4 Schools in the district including a resource center.

By: myadmin • April 24, 2019

In School Festival
On the 29th of March, Cranham Secondary hosted the in school festival competition which was coupled with learning and edutainment in the form of drama, music, poetry and dance. The festival witnessed a stiff competition between the two schools namely Cranham and Shingirirai CultureActions Clubs as they competed in a number of different disciplines while at the same time revealing the impacts of GBV, child marriage and climate change. The event attracted 600 people more specifically 400 students and 200 parents. Stakeholders such as the DSI, Ministry of Women Affairs, VFU, Ministry of Health, and Department of Social Welfare were also participants during the festival.
The festival functioned as a tool to inform the students and parents of the program’s commitment to challenge retrogressive social norms of GBV, child marriage and the mainstreaming of climate change through the transformative power of creative art. The two school received 3 thumb pianos each as an honor and all top students won 20 exercise books, pens and rulers as prices.