Dubai Cares to help educate 11,000 Malawi schoolgirls

Dubai, UAE: Dubai Cares on Tuesday rolled out a programme to educate 11,000 schoolgirls in Malawi, one of Africa’s poorest countries. In a culture where many marry young, and disease and teen pregnancy lead many girls to drop out from school, government officials and aid agencies in Malawi say the programme is sorely needed. Just 57 per cent of girls in Malawi complete primary school, according to Unesco. The programme will run in coordination with Dubai Cares and a local non-profit, the Creative Centre for Community Mobilisation (CRECCOM), and will target Thyolo, a remote area with a population of around 630,000. Most people in Thyolo work in agriculture, and around 85 per cent live in poverty. The programme will focus on schools delivering better education, including spruced-up English language training, and engaging local village communities. “Our main aim is to eradicate poverty, and we do it through education,” said Dubai Cares chief Tareq Al Gurg, announcing the programme at a Tuesday press conference. The conference took place in Blantyre, Malawi’s second city, situated an hour’s drive away from Thyolo district. Gurg added that Dubai Cares’ programmes work because of in-house systems and structures in place. The new programme took around six months to plan — and several trips between Malawi and Dubai by Dubai Cares staff. “We have an extensive monitoring and evaluation system. We invest in research, and appoint academic institutions to gather all the evidence,” the Dubai Cares chief said. Malawi is one of 40 countries where the UAE-based charity operates, working in partnership with on-the-ground non-profits. Malawi’s education minister, Emmanuel Fabiano, who was also present at the press conference, said that some of his country’s “strong social and cultural practices” has held back girl’s education. As well as early marriages and teen pregnancies, many parents tend to choose to pay school fees for boys instead of girls, he said. Disease is another stumbling block to progress. “Effects of HIV and Aids has left many girls and boys managing their families because they have got siblings to look after,” he said. “Children have to fend for themselves.” Malawi’s patchy road network and countless remote communities also hindered girls from reaching schools that are often far away, the minister said. “We may want to spend a bit more energy on these social factors.” The programme will target 100 primary schools and 12 secondary schools, reaching out to approximately 1,200 surrounding villages, making up a total of 60 per cent of Thyolo’s schools and communities. If successful, Dubai Cares officials say they hope to roll out the programme across the country. A senior official for CRECCOM, the local non-profit, welcomed the programme, saying that it will fit in with the organisation’s existing projects. “By involving the communities, the parents, the guardians … we have seen results, that indeed we are making progress,” said Joseph Kazima, CRECCOM’s vice-chairman. The announcement was timed to take place the same day as the UN’s International Day of the Girl Child, a global observance day which aims to raise awareness of gender inequality. © Gulf News

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