A World at School GYA Dyton Launches Girl Child Education Movement in Mangochi

She comes from a very poor family background and wakes up early in the morning to do household chores before her classes. During weekends she goes together with her twin sister to the forest to collect firewood which she sells for their day to day survival and she has been doing this for more than seven years now. Her parents have no any means and they depend on these two young girls as the bread winners for their family.

As any person, this girl has the vision too of becoming a professional doctor to serve people in Malawi. Her name is Lukia Ajasi. She is a 15 years old and currently in standard 8 at Chipunga Primary school in Mangochi district.

“I don’t feel bad because I know one day God will answer our prayers and we will be relieved from this bondage of poverty. That is why I work hard in school as I believe that is the only key to the problems we are facing today,” says Lukia.

Despite working hard in class, Lukia sees her dreams of becoming a doctor shuttered before her eyes due to the situations she goes through especially lack of necessities for her studies. She still works hard in class so that she can go to secondary school.

However she is very pessimistic about her future to secondary school in terms of school fees since currently she finds herself easy to pay school fund which is as cheaper as 1 dollar only.

There are a lot of girls in this community who have a similar story of Lukia but they don’t have an option rather than getting married at a tender age. Lukia is always undermined by others that she cannot do anything because of economic background of her family and also being girl. She never listens to these people but still looks forward for her dreams to be realized.

In a quest of promoting girl child education, a World at School Global Youth Ambassador Marshall Dyton who is also a 2015 Mandela Washngton Fellow came to the rescue of Lukia and her friend Amina Jossam who dreams of becoming a teacher currently in standard 7 at the same institution.

As an Entrepreneur Dyton said he is very touched with the situations the girls are facing in the country especially those in remote areas and he has embarked on Girl Child Education Movement (GCEM) which was launched at his former primary school (Chipunga) in Mangochi.

“Being the former learner for this institution, it’s my great concern that youths in this area especially girls are not doing well in their education and I want to take a part to promote and empower them that’s why I am here today. I want to sponsor these girls from Standard 8 up to a secondary level. I will be using 10% of annual profit from Freelance Web Solutions Malawi to support them and this is my gift to my community” he said.

Speaking during the colorful event which was attended by multitude of pupils from two primary schools, Group Village Headmen, Ward Councilors including T/A Bwana Nyambi, Dyton asked parents and guardians to encourage girls to work hard in their studies to transform their community and said he decided to establish the movement after observing that for more than ten years only less than 5 girls have been selected to government secondary school from Chipunga primary school and he donated writing materials to two students.

“Currently I will start by assisting two girls who do better in class but they face a lot of challenges and I have brought them writing materials and I promise that I will do anything possible for them to complete with their education.

“This is just the beginning of my mission for championing the girl child education but as we are going along the way, the number will be increased. I have also heard that there are other two girls who just stopped going to school for no apparent reason, I am giving the 72 hours to go back to school failing which I will ask Group Village Headman Somba to take action against their parents, ” said Dyton.

Speaking during the same event, T/A Bwana Nyambi commended Dyton for coming up with this good development in his areas saying this will help in promoting education.

“We have welcomed the development and I want to assure Dyton that he will never walk alone throughout the whole journey. We will work hand in hand with him through 75 Back to School committees we have set because this is a great honor to us. He has remembered to where he grew up and we don’t want to disappoint him. I will talk to parents whose their children are not going to school and make sure they they send the back,” said Bwana Nyambi.