Summit 2018 – Gokwe Town Council COE
Date: July 12, 2018
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Situated in the Midlands Province. Gokwe Town Council is synonymously known for being one of the fast improving towns. With a little over 24 000 inhabitants, it is one of the few local authorities who are headed by a female Town Secretary.
The council has a draft gender policy. They also have a number of policies that guide their operations vis-à-vis gender and service provision. Currently, there are 6 councillors (5 male and 1 female). The only female councillor happens to be the council mayor who chairs the full council. Gokwe Town has three committees, and none is chaired by a woman. Council has a junior council that is composed of more girls than boys whose leader is male. In Gokwe young people, people with disabilities and women in the community participate mostly in participate freely in consultative meetings, i.e, budget meetings. In most consultative meetings, women attendance is usually higher than that of men. Between 51-75% of women participate in public consultations.
Gokwe has a total workforce of 70 (49 men; 21 women). There is only one woman in the management team at Gokwe who is the Town Secretary and accounting officer in the council. In addition to the Town Secretary, the council however has a female waste supervisor working in non-traditional areas.
Zimbabwe by law prescribes maternity leave thus Gokwe provisions for it. The council does not prescribe to paternity leave. The council’s is still to experience any reports of sexual harassment in the workplace, but these cases are addressed through the Employment Code of Conduct. The council has ensured Disability-friendly access to its buildings by constructing ramps to the council main office.
Gokwe Town allocates a substantial budget to gender-related projects, these amounts have increased from 2016 to 2017.
| Category | Budget 2016 | Budget 2017 |
| Resources allocated to gender policy process and action planning | $3 500 | $3 500 |
| Resources allocated to promoting gender equality in decision-making and public participation | $3 500 | $3 500 |
| Resources allocated to promoting gender equality/family friendly/ youth and disability friendly policies and practices | $3 500 | $3 500 |
| 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 |
– |
– |
| Resources allocated to promoting gender/ youth and disability friendly SRHR, HIV and AIDS programmes | $3 500 | $3 500 |
| Resources allocated to ending gender violence | $3 500 | $3 500 |
| Resources allocated to visibility for the Council’s Gender Action Plan | $3 500 | $3 500 |
| Resources allocated to Monitoring, Evaluation and Learning for the Council’s Gender Action Plan | $3 500 | $3 500 |
Council works with care work projects like Chengston Home Based and Crisis Alleviation Centre. The Home Based Centre is responsible objectives are the provision of assistance to affected children by providing education related assistance, to fight stigma and discrimination , increasing HIV and AIDS awareness to encourage behaviour change and alleviating those in crisis as a result of HIV and AIDS.
Click here to read more about Gokwe Town.
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