BY BANELE MAGONGO
MBABANE – SOS Children’s Villages has successfully conducted training for 40 community leadership on Gender Equality & Sexual Reproductive Health (SRH) at the George Hotel in Manzini.
SOS did this in partnership with the Ministry of Health and the training was conducted yesterday (Thursday, July 25, 2024).
The SOS Children’s Villages Communications Coordinator Temalangeni Dlamini stated SOS Children’s Villages works with the Inner Council in communities, as an entry point of the programmes that we implement in the communities. The organisations build their capacity on issues of gender and SRH. Through the training we aim to create stakeholder who are gender sensitive, who will influence policy making at grass root level, to promote gender and SRH adaptation in their communities.
SOS Children’s Villages, National Director, Phindile Nhleko Makama presented to the community leadership about the big programme shifts that are taking place within the organisation and further elaborated on how the programmes work and how they benefit families and children in the various communities.
“As SOS Children’s Villages expands its programme interventions and we want to work with more communities, for family empowerment for quality childcare. We would love the inner council to own the programmes and projects that SOS brings to the communities for accountability and sustainability. Thus, it is important to us, that the inner council understands the issues of children and young people and foster their protection”, said Makama.
“I believe that as the inner council, we have received adequate and relevant information about the issues that young people face in their communities. This will help us accommodate changes of growth in young people and promote parent and child communication”, said one of the participants, Hezekia Mdluli.
It is stated that the objective of the training was to capacitate community leadership on gender equality and Sexual Reproductive Health (SRH). The community leadership were familiarised with the country’s statistic of ASHR (Adolescent Sexual & Reproductive Health Rights). The training capacitated the Inner council (Bandlancane) on the different types of STIs, how they are contracted, their symptoms and prevention. They also learnt about the negative impacts of teenage pregnancy or unplanned pregnancies. A key emphasis of the training was the importance of child protection within the communities.
The session gathered council from Mbilaneni, Siphocosini, Sigangeni and KaLanga, who are communities where SOS Children’s Villages currently implement its projects.
