Areas of Implementation: Kiryandongo, Kyegegwa, Kamwenge, Isingiro
The girl child is seen as a commodity through which the family can earn livelihood, especially in vulnerable communities in Uganda. She is traded into marriage as a child and expected to live as an adult. Her dilemma which is rooted in traditional cultural perceptions has been escalated by COVID19.
The girl child is denied the opportunity to develop her skills and talent; her contribution to the wellbeing of her future and community is neglected. Sadly, her person is reduced to a commodity that can be exchanged for another commodity like cows, money and land.
Through Accelerate Progress towards Ending Child Marriage in Uganda project, we are able to arise and advocate for the girls’ rights with funding from People’s Post Code Lottery.
According to UNICEF, Uganda has the 16th highest prevalence rate of child marriage in the world. 40% of girls are married before their 18th birthday; one in ten is married before the age of 15.
The state of affairs for the girl child drives the purpose of the project to create a world without child marriage, where girls are equal to boys and can reach their full potential.
Objective
To build collaborative linkages between GNBU partners & other stakeholders working to end Child Marriages in Northern Uganda.
Expanding and attracting new organisations to the membership of GNBU in Western Uganda.
Location.
The focus area of this project is in the refugee hosting communities of Kamwenge, Isingiro, Kiryandongo, Kyegegwa and Arua districts.
It is being implemented through five members of Girls Not Brides Uganda based in the focus areas.
How we are accelerating progress to End Child Marriage in Uganda
We aim to unlock the potential of a wide range of partners. Therefore, we are encouraging them to increase efforts through collaboration to demonstrate that accelerated change at scale is possible.
We are aligned to address child marriage and support unmarried and married girls. Driving implementation and financing important policies and services for girls and young women to shift harmful gender norms and strengthen collective action to ensure that civil society, government and other partners work together to drive meaningful change in girls’ lives.
We are collaborating with key champions who publicly support alternatives to child marriage. Champions including traditional and religious leaders in Uganda play a key role in shaping public opinion in the community.
Girls Not Brides Uganda is influencing media narratives and runs campaigns to influence the public debate on child marriage
Activities & Limitations
In celebration of the International Girl Child Day, we recently hosted a twitter chat on 14th October, 2020. We had both direct and indirect partners on chat and it was an insightful and momentum driving engagement.
On 24th July 2020, Joy For Children Uganda together with Girls Not Brides Uganda convened a member outreach meeting in Western Uganda and engaged 28 CSOs working to address issues around Ending Child Marriage in humanitarian and non humanitarian setting.
In this meeting, we received 15 organisations expressing interest in becoming members of GNBU, 7 of the 15 have already submitted their applications and are awaiting approval of the Steering Committee.
We engaged CSO’s from 13 districts of Western Uganda working on child protection and gender equality. Three district officials attended and pledged to work with existing GNBU members.
We hosted a similar meeting in Northern Uganda at the end of September with the aim of increasing membership of GNBU in Northern Uganda districts. Our target was to introduce 20 stakeholders to GNBU work and share opportunities to partners who wish to be part of the wider membership of GNBU. Prior to this meeting we had a one on one virtual meeting with identified organisations in the region to explore possible areas of collaboration.
In May 2020, the project partners of GNBU, MEMPRO and CEDO were sub-granted among the best selected five GNBU partners to implement the Accelerator Project activities.
However, they experienced delays in the implementation of some activities in the two districts; Kiryando for CEDU and Arua for MEMPRO because of the COVID19 state enforced lockdown that prohibited gatherings.
We are grateful that we registered progress amidst these conditions and we are looking forward to more timely and frequent field visits among other districts to foster project activity implementation.
