Hazel Mafararikwa shows some of the products they make as part of the Girls Act income generating projects
BY MUNYARADZI BLESSING DOMA
“This programme really changed my life because growing up being raised by a single mother was tough.
“There are many ills that I could have fallen victim to, but the Girls Act programme empowered me with knowledge and income generating projects.”
These were the words of Hazel Mafararikwa, who is a member of the Girls Act programme which is being implemented in her Mafararikwa community by the AIDS Healthcare Foundation (AHF) and National AIDS Council (NAC).
Hazel is one of the many girls whose lives were saved as a result of the programme.
Living in a community where child marriages seem to be the norm, many like Hazel have been saved from the vice and HIV, whose statistics reveal that adolescent girls and young women are disproportionately affected.
Hazel joined the Girls Act programme in 2020 and at first, she thought it was a waste of time because they had seen other projects fail to uplift them.
“When we started the programme I thought it was just a waste of time but with time I saw that it was good for me.
“I have managed to learn so many skills like sawing, detergents and drinks making, carpentry to mention a few.
“I’m now empowered as a result of this programme,” Hazel revealed during an interview.
She added that while some programmes lack continuity, the Girls Act has given them hope as they are continuously encouraged and empowered to be better individuals.
Hazel who is now the Vice Coordinator for projects, had struggled financially whilst growing up but now she says she earns a lot of money from all the projects that she is involved in.
“I’m now empowered because I make a lot of money from the skills I have learned.
“Now I complement my husband’s efforts.”
She added: “this programme really changed my life because it was very difficult growing up without my father who died when I was in Grade 2 in 2002.
“From the time he died, it was really difficult because my mum took care of us single handedly, so when the Girls Act programme was introduced, I just felt they were heaven sent because my life changed.”
Hazel further revealed that her husband fully supports her membership with the Girls Act programme.
“I have two kids and I’m happy to say that I pay fees for them.
“Some people used to discourage us because they thought we were doing immoral things since we are also involved in condom distribution.
“But now they admire the progress we have made and want to join us.
“Let me be honest to say that I had never used dish washing liquid in my life and my kids only used to enjoy drinks on special occasions like Christmas but that has all changed because of the Girls Act programme.
“And apart from the material benefits, this programme also helps us with the much needed information on things like sexual and reproductive health, sexually transmitted illnesses, HIV and child marriages.
“We are also taught about the Gender Based Violence, so I can safely say I have been fully empowered by this programme,” added Hazel.
Similar sentiments were echoed by Trish Mukwada aged 23, a Girls Act Peer Educator also from Mafararikwa Village.
As someone who was married early, Trish revealed that the programme had made significant changes in her life.
“I joined the programme when I was 19 and it has helped me on the issue of child marriages because I’m a survivor.
“I was married at a very young age and it affected me when I gave birth because I had a C-section and even for my second child, I also did the same, so that’s the main challenge I saw.
“Also I got to learn a lot on STIs and family planning.
“I have come to know that I have a right to get pregnant when I want.
“And because of the income generating projects I’m now able to take care of my children,” said Trish.
Hope Chirara, Linkage Coordinator for AHF in Mutare, revealed that they were working with the National AIDS Council (NAC) and other organisations.
He added that the programme was necessitated following the realization of worrying NAC statistics which revealed that girls are disproportionately affected by HIV, STIs, early marriages, sexual violence among other issues.
Hope also revealed that 2021 statistics had further shown that a quarter of new HIV infections were of young women aged between 15-24 years and a quarter also gave birth before the age of 18.
“So as a result of the problems affecting young women, we planned with ZNFPC (Zimbabwe National Family Planning Council) and community leaders to do a research to see what the issue was with school drop outs and child marriages.
“So we realised that poverty was a major issue.
“The Girls Act programme is targeting girls aged 15-24 and the main objective is to ensure there is provision of health information to adolescent young girls and women.
“The other objective is to implement income generating projects because we were seeing that many young girls were dropping out of school because of economic hardships so we thought how best can we make them stay in school.
“So we decided to equip them hence we took them to vocational training schools and they are taught life skills, be it garment making, detergent making, carpentry.
“Also another objective is to capacitate adolescent girls and young women on their health rights so that they can stand for themselves and they can challenge the inequalities in HIV issues so that they know they have the rights to seek treatment,” revealed Hope.
He added that the theme for the programme is “Keeping the promise to the girls” and the strategy is that it is “youth led, for the youth, by the youth” for sustainability and benefits.
“ZNFPC has a programme to train peer educators and once a child is trained, she can also help others in the community.
“We also do sanitary wear production and distribution, so we are empowering young girls to get sanitary wear so this is helping so much in schools and the community.
“Community dialogues on child marriages also help here in Mafararikwa Village because there are a lot of such issues so we have meetings with community members and village heads.
“Other religious leaders have also joined in the fight against child marriages.
“Also another education benefit is that we have the Girl Child Scholarship which we support as AHF.
“We give support for tertiary institutions so that they can choose career paths of their choices.
“Also we sponsor school competitions which are health related, like two weeks ago we had a quiz competition on SRHR.
“So we are saying we should end child marriages, let’s capacitate young girls so that they can develop further in pursuit of brighter futures,” he added.
Hope also revealed that the Girls Act programme is also in-line with the country’s Vision 2030 to improve quality of life looking at the Social Development pillar, because of the economic strengthening projects.
