SOS Children’s Villages Malawi realizes that adequate financing is a requirement for the realisation of the child wellbeing considering that all instruments promoting children’s rights like the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the child, the African Charter on the Rights and welfare of the child (ACRWC) including all national laws, policies and acts such as the Child Care Protection and Justice Act (CCPJA2010) demand resources for their implementation and realisation and without resources they remain empty promises.
This is why it partners with other like-minded organisations to advocate and lobby for reforms that will support and improve the work for children under our care. It is clear that no organisation can meet the multiple child care and child rights challenges alone.” Said Mr. Smart Namagonya, the National Director of SOS Children’s Villages Malawi. In this regard, the parliamentary committee on social and community affairs is another very important structure of influence which SOS Children’s Villages Malawi is interested to collaborate more especially on policy engagement.
The chairperson of the Parliamentary Committee on Social and Community Affairs, Mr. Chimwendo Banda said the committee is greatly pleased with the tremendous work SOS Children’s Villages Malawi is doing in Malawi regarding promotion of quality child care and child rights in the country. The committee further plans to engage SOS Children’s Villages Malawi to be a key parliamentary stakeholder which can provide input into several areas regarding child development in the country.
“The resolutions from this meeting should not end here, rather this should unlock doors for our continued engagement and further collaboration in other initiatives in future.” he said.
Going forward, SOS Children’s Villages Malawi has been asked to champion the public resource tracking program in the local assemblies citing the dire need that is there in tracking public expenditure for child care and rights resources. With the successes registered from tracking the health and education sectors in the local assemblies by other actors, it is hoped that coming up with a vibrant mechanism to track the resources for children in the local assemblies has the potential to enhance optimum utilization of resources in compliance with the national priorities in the Malawi Growth and Development Strategy which is the countries strategic blue print.
Through the Better Care Network which SOS Chairs, tracking public expenditure for child programming resources is possible. The lobby meeting ended on a very high note, everyone was energized and realized that there is an urgent ongoing need to engage, lobby and advocate for reforms that will transform child programming in the country and ensure every child enjoys quality care.
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