This Spotlight funded project under UNICEF responds to requests by the Hurungwe community (where Envision Zimbabwe Women’s Trust has collaborated for many years in peace building) for assistance in tackling the increase in VAW/G they are experiencing over the last year during the COVID19 epidemic. The majority of the community in Hurungwe District, a remote rural district of Zimbabwe bordering Zambia, are poor small-holder farmers, vulnerable to the impact of the current drought and economic hardship, stresses that increase Violence against women and girls (VAW/G) and that have been exacerbated by the COVID19 pandemic. Additionally, families and communities have shared beliefs and unspoken rules that both proscribe and prescribe behaviour that implicitly conveys that VAW/G is acceptable, even normal.
Through the use of conflict transformation techniques the project aims to create safer communities in Hurungwe District for women and girls by understanding, interrogating and challenging social norms that sustain VAW/G and promoting social norms that uphold women’s and girls’ safety and dignity and peace in the community. In April 2021 Envision held a three day workshop with the Traditional leaders of Ward 13, Hurungwe District on prevention of VAW/G. After the workshop some of the participants shared their stories with Envision. A workshop was also held for the Peace Committee members and the Intergenerational Women’s Group who were trained as trainers and mentors to prevent VAW/G. Two of these Community Cadres provide feedback on their experiences of the project.
- Meeting the only female Village Head in Ward 13 Hurungwe
Diana Foya, known as Sabhuku Chiwanza B, at 37 is the only female Village Head in Ward 13 of Chidamoyo. She grew up in Guruve and moved to Chidamoyo after getting married at 18, where she lives with her husband and four children. She has been a village head for a year and half now and enjoys her new role although as a woman leader she has met with some challenges.
Her story
I am Sabhuku Chiwanza B. I became Sabhuku last year after our village head was impressed by my ideas and contributions at village ward meetings. Chiwanza is a very big village so it was divided into 2 villages, which are Chiwanza A and B, I am Chiwanza B. I am very vocal and I don’t hesitate to say my views even within my political party, hence Chiwanza A thought I would make a good village head and nominated me to become a Sabhuku. People accepted me as their Sabhuku although some other village heads were not happy and spread malicious rumours that I could have been involved with the Sabhuku who gave me the post or even with the Chief. It is difficult for a woman to become a leader and not be smeared by rumours of giving sexual favours in return for positions.
The main reason I accepted this position was to make accessing inputs and other food programmes easier for vulnerable people, who were often left out due to the size of the village. As a woman I don’t believe in corruption or taking advantage of provisions to enrich myself. Inputs should benefit the intended candidates and thus I make sure it is done accordingly. I know many male village heads that are corrupt and I don’t encourage that. I have noticed that women become sexually abused by village leaders in order to get provisions. The COVID-19 environment has caused a lot of violence and family divisions. Women sleep around for food and when they bring that food back home to their children it ends in violence when their husbands find out how they got that food. Also it’s very true that child marriages have gone up since lockdown. Young girls have been impregnated, their families decide to accept lobola and damages and hide this from us. When you ask them about these cases, which we often hear as rumours, they always lie and say their child visited relatives. In my village I am aware of two secondary school girls who were married under lockdown and their parents have refused to openly admit this.
This traditional leaders’ workshop has greatly empowered me with knowledge of how to treat and handle issues to do with sexual and reproductive health rights, gender based violence and prevention of sexual exploitation and abuse. I appreciate this very much, I was not fully aware of these rights and how and where to channel matters to do with these topics. Now I have been enlightened and as a woman this is very important to me. I am here to represent women and children and I want our girls to be empowered to make the right choices.
- Confessions of a Former Religious Leader in Sexual Exploitation
In Ward 13 there are quite a number of Apostolic Faith Churches, better known as white garment churches. Members of this faith are known to engage in early child marriages and also give men permission to marry as many wives as they like. Apart from this white garment leaders are notorious for sexually exploiting women in the name of prayer and casting out evil spirits. One such leader is a Village Head called Sabhuku Dzingai, he was once a white garment church leader and misled many women into having sexual relations with him.
His Story
I am Sabhuku Dzingai from Menembwa aged 41 years and I am married to one wife and have three children. The information I have received in this workshop is very eye-opening and I feel I should share what I used to do as a church leader. I was in a very prestigious position as I could prophecy and help people spiritually. Women have many troubles in their homes including that of cheating husbands, violent husbands or nonstop menstrual cycles, which may be caused by spiritual attacks and always approach us for prayers. After praying for these women, I would hear that some had not slept with their husbands for some time since the husbands were cheating or running away from their homes, some women were getting beaten or were not getting money to feed the family. I would pray for them and then tell them I love them and comfort them. It was easy for women to agree to my sexual demands as they thought I was special. Often I would give them a bit of money, I never met any resistance from these women. I have slept with quite a number of women, I know now that I was exploiting them. The gift never left me despite my actions I could still prophecy and heal them. My wife never confronted me, although I know that she was suspecting me. I could have married other women, but I made her feel special by not taking more wives maybe that is why she overlooked my actions. After some time I stopped praying for people as I wanted to make money through tobacco farming. Our religion does not permit tobacco farming. Now I am a farmer and Sabhuku.
This workshop has given me a lot of information that I was not aware of. I was very ignorant and exploited women. Now I understand that it is illegal and it degrades women. Had I continued I could have easily raped the women too. Domestic violence is very prevalent in our villages and I often encouraged women to listen to their husbands and do as they say even if it’s forced marital sex. I call upon you Envision Zimbabwe to continue teaching and guiding us so we can be better leaders, the Government should intervene too and educate us on such important matters.
- A Traditional Leader Taking Advantage of Poor Single Mothers
In the last couple of years the country received poor rains and ward 13 in Hurungwe West was not spared. This affected most poor households’ food supplies. Women have to struggle to feed their families and often end up falling prey to corrupt and wayward village heads, who are responsible for distributing inputs and food assistance from government schemes to needy communities. One such village head who testified to having taken advantage of helpless women is 47 years old Sabhuku Chafuradombo from Dzimaiwe. He is married to one wife and has five children.
His Story
As a Sabhuku I have come to understand in this workshop that I have made many mistakes as a leader. I am confessing because now I have been enlightened and I know I have to change the way I have been behaving towards women especially single parent women. It is very common here for village heads to sleep with women in exchange for what they need. I have slept with some of them in exchange for food assistance and including their names in the list of beneficiaries for food aid. Most of the single mothers have returned back home to their parents after being left by their husbands or widowed. The women are often counted under a household and that means the food aid may not be enough to cater for a big household. This forces the single mothers to approach us and ask for aid, in return I would often ask for sexual favours for continued assistance. I have done this to women who are desperate and they give in. I can count just a couple who have been strong enough to refuse to have sexual relations with me. Usually these don’t come back to ask for further assistance. Some of the village heads have been left by their wives because of this behaviour.
I have learnt that as village heads we should not exploit single mothers, we call them mvana, this term is used derogatorily to make them feel ashamed for not having husbands to look after their children. Village heads often do not offer single women land, but their fathers or brothers can give them a piece of their own land so they can grow food for their children. There is scarcity of land now in our villages so we do not prioritise single women. I understand that this is suppressing women, the law is bigger than our culture as we have learnt now. I hope to change the way I have treated women, I never really understood what equal rights meant, but now I have been enlightened. Women go through many hardships and we as men are guilty of most of those hardships.
- Dadirai’s Story: SGBV Training Changed My Life
Dadirai is a 46 old woman living in Batanai village, Hurungwe District. She attended the Envision workshop held in Chidamoyo Village for the Intergenerational Women’s Group on SRHR, SGBV and PSEA, and she says it transformed her life. Dadirai was in an abusive marriage and she had been facing domestic violence for the past 15 years. She explained that her husband would constantly abuse her emotionally and sometimes physically. She had accepted the abuse as her normal way of living as she had been conditioned to believe that according to traditional ideas of masculinity it was normal for men to prove love for their wives through ‘physical discipline’. She related that she had had no sexual and reproductive health rights since her husband had always forced her to have more children before she had finished weaning a child. This had resulted in her having a number of miscarriages.
The three-day workshop that she attended changed her life by empowering her on knowledge of her rights and emancipating her from the abuse and exploitation by her husband. She indicated that because she had negotiating skills through Envision’s Conflict Transformation training the first person she was able to educate was her husband, to whom she explained everything she had learnt from the workshop. She disclosed to her husband that he would be arrested if he continued to abuse her because the Law and the Constitution of Zimbabwe now empowered women to report all forms abuse and obtain justice. This she said has saved her from continual abuse by her husband. Through the knowledge that she gained in the workshop she has managed to empower other people in the community using herself as an example of how the knowledge of SGBV, SRHR and PSEA transformed her life.
- Judith’s Story: Peace Committee Work in Hurungwe
Judith Chifodya is a 53-year-old woman who resides in Hurungwe, she is from Mahwada village. She is happily married and has 5 children and 2 grandchildren. She was trained as a Peace Committee member in Conflict Transformation skills and recently attended the training of trainers’ workshop facilitated by Envision on SRHR SGBV and PSEA.
Her journey as a community cadre was successful as she managed to cascade the information that she had learnt to community members in her village. During the outreach training she came across a challenging case after she had taught about SGBV. She indicated that at this particular homestead the grandfather sexually abused his two granddaughters, justifying this by the phrase ‘muzukuru mukadzi’, which translated means ‘my granddaughters my wives’. The case was discovered by the girls’ mother who had reported it to the Chief and the grandfather was told to pay a cow as a fine. After coming in contact with the survivors Judith assisted the mother to refer the case to Magunje Police Victim Friendly Unit, where the case is being investigated and the girls are now safe and have received psychosocial support. Judith is happy because her knowledge has impacted positively on the survivors’ lives and the girls’ mother considers that they are now receiving support and justice for this case.
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