adminLatwell Nyangu recently in Guruve
At least over twenty young people from the rural community of Guruve have been trained of Sexual Reproductive Health and Research (SRHR) to combat child marriages and Sexually Transmitted Infections (STIs).
The initiative comes courtesy of Women Excel Trust under the Girls Education and Advocacy (GEAR) Alliance. The programme was done under the Sexuality Education for Transformation (SET), a project being funded by Amplify Change.
The hope is that these young people will then be able to train other SRHR champions that can advocate provisions in Guruve Rural District.
Sixty young people will be trained in Zimbabwe with 200 champions to be trained across five countries.
“Women Excel Trust engaged other young people who are already champions and experts in SRH to train 20 identified young people that will be championing SRH advocacy in Guruve Rural District under the SET project for the next two years.
“We had a three-day workshop where different SRH issues were being raised by the young people.
“The major concern was a wide spread of Sexually Transmitted Infections (STIs) among young people as well as a surge in child marriages which has been normalized in some parts of the Guruve community.
“Not leaving drug and substance use which have been a cancer among young people, some even dropped out of school due to use of Guka and Mutoriro in Guruve Rural District,” Women Excel Director, Rodney Mutombo.
He said, young people need to be capacitated.
“As Women Excel Trust, we believe that these young people are now capacitated enough to push for the SRH and CSE advocacy agenda.
“We believe they will be able now to lobby other young people, community gate keepers, religious and traditional leaders to influence policies right from the grassroots level.”
During the project, the young people will help in championing Comprehensive Sexuality Education (CSE) policies.
Mathew Masinge
Online Reporter