Summit 2018 – Epworth Local Board COE
Date: July 12, 2018
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Epworth is located about twelve kilometres from the Harare city centre. It is a high-density dormitory town administered by the Epworth Local Board. It is bisected by a stream into two parts. The Balancing Rocks found in the northern approaches of the town are a famous attraction.
The council has a draft gender policy. Despite this, the council has a number of policies that guides their operations vis-à-vis gender and service provision. Currently, there are seven councillors (5 male and 2 female). Epworth Local Board has three committees, and only one is chaired by a woman. Council has a junior council that is composed of equal numbers of girls and boys whose leader is male.
In Epworth young people, people with disabilities and women in the community participate mostly in participating freely in ward development and budget consultative meetings. Women’s attendance at these meetings is usually higher than that of men as 51-75% of women participate in these meetings. Epworth has a total workforce of 184 (103 men; 81 women). Two out of the seven managers in the council are women. None of the women in Epworth works in non-traditional areas of employment.
Zimbabwe by law prescribes maternity leave thus Epworth provisions for it. The council does not prescribe to paternity leave. The council has no Sexual Harassment policy thus cases of this nature are addressed using the Council’s Employment Code of Conduct. The council has ensured Disability-friendly access to its buildings by constructing ramps to the council clinics, schools and ablution facilities.
Epworth Local Board allocates makes budgetary provisions to gender-related projects from 2016 to 2017 as below:
| Category | Budget 2016 | Budget 2017 |
| Resources allocated to gender policy process and action planning | $213 | $1 200 |
| Resources allocated to promoting gender equality in decision-making and public participation |
– |
– |
| Resources allocated to promoting gender equality/family friendly/ youth and disability friendly policies and practices |
– |
– |
| Resources allocated to gender-responsive local economic development | – | – |
| Resources allocated to promoting gender/youth/PWD responsive projects on climate change |
– |
– |
| Resources allocated to promoting gender/ youth and disability friendly infrastructure and social development policies and practices |
– |
$70 000 |
| Resources allocated to promoting gender/ youth and disability friendly SRHR, HIV and AIDS programmes |
– |
– |
| Resources allocated to ending gender violence |
– |
– |
| Resources allocated to visibility for the Council’s Gender Action Plan |
– |
– |
| Resources allocated to Monitoring, Evaluation and Learning for the Council’s Gender Action Plan |
– |
– |
Epworth is an HIV/AIDS prone area and council tackles this through:
-Promoting voluntary HIV/AIDS testing and counselling through its clinics.
-Defaulter tracing for TB patients and others with chronic illnesses.
-Home visits: water and sanitation home inspections, water quality control through the health department. The council also has volunteer caregivers whom they render support in the form of capacity building and health training. Only 7% of caregivers are men in Epworth.
Click here to read more about Epworth Local Board.
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