Strengthening the Voice and Rights of Women in Swaziland The programme presented here reflects the culmination of several months of development on the part of CAFOD and our partners in Swaziland, which has shown the real need for programmes to focus on strengthening women’s understanding of and access to rights as well as their participation in voicing how their rights and needs in local/national policies and practices are represented. This programme is women specific, based on the analysis of how legislative and cultural practices and norms impact on women negatively and how exclusion and marginalisation disproportionately affect women and girls in Swaziland.

Specifically, this programme will contribute to IPDF’s aim of strengthening women’s empowerment. It seeks to create opportunities for women to participate in and influence household, community and national decisions.  The programme appreciates the fact that without proper understanding of their rights and access to means to enforce those rights, women will remain on the margins of society and will remain excluded from decision making processes at all levels.  Evidence from CAFOD’s work around the region shows that where women and girls are supported to demand their rights from husbands, local leaders or others, this has a significant impact on their confidence and standing in society, allowing them to tackle other issues of development.  Through its community-based paralegal strategy, the programme will reach 86 400 women and girls, men and boys with legal information about their rights as well as referral services of where to go for assistance. 20% of the total figure reached will be for men and boys 

Through the Women’s Charter development strategy, the programme will work with 110 community based women to initiate discussions and capture women’s views on the different laws, polices and customs that impact their lives. This will actively engage over 8 800 women and girls through a country-wide consultation process using community conversations in rural and urban areas to draft a Women’s Charter.  This will give a broad range of women and girls the opportunity to debate and discuss their own role in society at household and community levels and to outline core principles of what women want to see in national level policies and practices to ensure that existing discriminatory practices are challenged and women have a genuine role to play in shaping local and national decision making. 

To ensure effective programme management, the programme will support the training and institutional strengthening of WLSA Swaziland, which will include training and accompaniment in key CAFOD areas such as Child Protection and supply chain management. Emphasis will also be placed on providing support to ensure effective monitoring, evaluation and documentation in order to me the reporting requirements of UKaid Match Fund.

Outcomes:
1.	 Increased access to accurate information and justice for 69 120 women and girls in Swaziland by 2015.
2.	 Increased public discourse and debate on national policies and practices, in particular how the rights of women are properly included and represented
3.	Increased institutional capacity of WLSA to effectively manage and implement its programmes

Indicators:
The programme is seeking to contribute to the following broad indicator under the UKaid Match Fund Framework: Number of women and girls participating in activities to increase opportunities and confidence in decision-making. 

Activities:
These include the following key activities:
1.	Training and deployment of 60 community based paralegals
2.	Community information dissemination meetings
3.	Development of Women’s Charter
4.	Community consultative and outreach meetings on the Women’s Charter
5.	Institutional capacity strengthening for WLSA
6.	Programme monitoring and evaluation processes