Role of Ministry of Gender
at One Stop Centres
Dominic Misomali
Justin Hamela
Ministry of Gender, Children,
Disabilities and Social Welfare
Learning Objectives
• The participant will be able to:
• Understand the national and international laws
that serve as the basis for the Ministry of Gender’s
role in addressing child abuse and gender-based
violence.
• Explain the role of social welfare workers in
assessing families and providing case management.
• Understand the role of social welfare workers
within the one stop centre multidisciplinary team.
Presentation Outline
• Introduction
• The Role of MoGCSW
• The Mandate of Social Welfare
• The Role of a Social Worker
• The Role of Community Child
Protection Worker
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Introduction
 GBV and Child abuse have detrimental effects to its
victims.
 It affects women and men and children.
 Malawi is a party to CEDAW, ACRWC, CRC.
 Being a member Malawi is to take necessary measures
to protect its citizens from abuse and violence.
 MOGCSW has that shared responsibility to prevent
the occurrence, protect and support survivors.
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Mandate from National Law
• The national laws have provide of government
responsibilities and that of specific departments
or Ministry
• Sec 23- chpt. 4 of the Malawi Constitution provides
“protection against any kind of exploitation” to all
children under the age of 16
• Sec 138 of the penal code states that “girls under the
age of 13 years should be protected from sexual
exploitation i.e sexual intercourse or attempted
sexual intercourse
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Legal instruments that
guide the Ministry
 Malawi Constitution
 Child Care, Protection
and Justice Act, 2010
 Adoption of Child Act
 Married Women
Maintenance Act
 Wills and Inheritance
Act
 Prevention of Domestic
Violence Act
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 Probation of Offenders Act
 Statement of Development
Policies
 NGO law
 Cabinet Directive of 1964,
1995
 National Policies; ECD,
OVC, Gender, NPA
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The Role of MoGCSW
• The name MoGCDSW connotes its mandate
• It has departments of Gender, Community
Development, Social Welfare , Child affairs and
Disabilities.
• It looks at the wellbeing of marginalised groups as
women, children, people with disabilities and other
vulnerable poor people in the society.
• It has mandates for Policy making and provision of
legal direction and enforcement
• Social work is its professional approach used
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Introduction to Social Work
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•
Social work its profession for helping people help
themselves and their communities in addressing the
problems they faced.
•
Malawi has the demand for social work due to
growth of population, weakening of community
bonds, poverty and its accompanying ills.
•
Increasingly more and more people are unable to
socially function and this in turn has led to
widespread social dysfunction and a greater demand
for social work.
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Main focus and goal of social work
• Restoration: The social worker helps clients to
face realities and to solve problems.
• Social work help to solve personal, group and
community problems.
• This involves provision of individual and social
resources and services
• The services include:
• Provision of individual and social resources and
services
• Assist individuals find their ground
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Main focus and goal of social work
• Prevention of social dysfunction: This involves
early discovery, control, and elimination of
conditions and situations that potentially could
hamper social functioning. This operates at two
levels:
• Prevention of problems through counselling.
• Prevention of social ills through advocacy and
action against social ills.
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Importance of social work
• Empowers individuals and groups with a
collective identity to handle themselves
• Strengthens and uses existing resources
• Recognizes, clients inherent resources and
potential problem
• Recognizes that clients have solutions to
problems
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Problems that needs social work
• Family disorganisation and child neglect: eg
child neglect
• Crime and delinquency: Social workers deal
with prevention of crime as well as helping
those in crime to seek ways of reforming.
• Substance abuse
• Gender Based Violence
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Social problems that need social work
• Poverty
• Mental illness: –addressing the needs of
those mentally ill and their relatives.(social
workers and medical personnel can work
together)
• Problems of aging: – addressing the needs of
the ageing.
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Challenges of social work
 The professional is hardly recognized and
respected
 It is usually under funded
 It is usually adopted and claimed by nonprofessionals/untrained social workers there by
harming clients instead of supporting them
 In Malawi we have no regularatory body nor
association for social workers.
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Some of the Functions of Social
Workers in Case Management
1.Initial Assessment and Investigation Stage
a) Work with OSC MDT and determine
occurrence of abuse or neglect.
b) Assess the family environment vs cultural and
family beliefs.
c) Assess level of risk of the survivor.
d) Determine emergency needs of the survivor
and service required.
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2. Case Planning and Service
Delivery Stage
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• Safety and security mechanisms in order for the client
to return home
• Finding alternative placement for the survivor
• Providing psychosocial counseling for both the
survivor and caregiver
• Consultations with caregivers as well as mapping
significant people .
• Follow up using networks with various stakeholders
such as community child protection workers
• Social workers need to obtain informed consent from
the survivor
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3. Referral and transfer of cases
• Referral means transferring the client from one
social worker to another within the same agency, the
client should however know the new social worker.
• Clients may be referred when necessary.
• Caseworker may continue to work with the client
after referral eg follow up.
• Clients should be involved in decision making
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4. Case Closure
• A case can be closed when a client is safe from revictimization,
• Or when survivor is coping well,
• Or the survivors needs have been met and is satisfied
• Or the survivor has been reintegrated back into her
family/community
• Periodic home visits are conducted to see how the
survivor is settling.
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General Responsibilities at OSC
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• Maintain and manage OSC data.
• Compile quarterly report and submit to relevant
authorities.
• Organise monthly home visit to survivors of abuse.
• Maintain and update the referral database and
catalogue of organization serving abused children.
• Organize for monthly case review meeting with OSC
team.
• Make case follow ups to Police Stations on the
progress of abuse cases reported to them in liaison
with the OSC police officer.
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The Role of Community Child
Protection Worker at OSC
• Manage abuse cases.
• Refer cases to the colleagues from the community
where the client is coming from.
• Conduct home follow ups.
• Refer the cases to other service providers.
• Conduct communities sensitizations.
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The End
YEWO
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