MINISTRY OF GENDER , NGOs LAMENT FUNDING WOES TOWARDS CHILD PROTECTION

By Kenson McCloud 

Non-Governmental Organisation Coalition on Child Rights (NGO-CCR) has echoed Ministry of Gender’s call for the Treasury to increase allocation towards child protection efforts as a way of curbing child abuse cases in the country.

NGO-CCR was reacting to a ministerial statement by Minister of Gender, Community Development and Social Welfare, Patricia Kaliati, who bemoaned resource constraints her ministry is facing to effectively deal with challenges many children in the country are facing including violence, abuse, exploitation and neglect.

Kaliati revealed that district social welfare offices receive MWK 200,000 to cater for administration and operations for their work. 

In an interview with Timveni, NGO-CCR Executive Director, Desmond Mhango, challenged government to prove its commitment towards improving children’s welfare by increasing allocation towards social welfare to cater effectively for matters of children.

Mhango said the country risks to continue registering high cases of child marriages and teen pregnancies among others due to failure by government to sufficiently fund programs on children’s welfare under the social welfare department.

Meanwhile, the Ministry of Gender says it has registered 23,396 cases of violence, abuse, exploitation and neglect against children in the past year.