Muungano Gender Forum

Muungano Gender Forum (Muungano meaning ‘together’) is a multisectoral platform for discussing women’s rights in Kisii and Nyamira counties. When launched in 2018, the project organized monthly duty bearer sessions in Kisii town. In 2021, Muungano expanded into rural communities and among rights holders. In 2022-25, the two main components remain and complement each other and the partner-led projects in the 11 rural locations where the partners operate. There is regular cooperation with Kisii and Nyamira County Governments to coordinate civil society organizations’ efforts to fulfil women’s rights.

The main development processes in 2024 are as follows:

• Muungano will continue to arrange safe grassroots platforms for community dialogue. The forums bring together men, women and youth with local duty bearers (such as local administrators, judicial officials, child protection officers, police and chiefs) to build mutual trust and enhance reporting and victim sensitive processing of VAWG cases. Also, they bring external experts and topics identified by the local Muungano Steering Committee into communities.
• Besides violence and discrimination against women that are at the core of the forums, some forums will also focus on women’s economic empowerment, including mentoring by successful local businesswomen. Also, the project will organize two trade fair events called Soko Freshi to increase women farmers’ visibility and to link them with input suppliers and food companies.
• With the Kisii and Nyamira County Governments and other local stakeholders, Muungano aims to boost local movement via, for example, celebration of International UN Days such as the 16 Days of Activism against GBV. Muungano also engages with the Counties to strengthen the Gender sector coordination meetings for actions such as development of County Gender Policy.
• Muungano continues developing its advocacy and communications work by participating in county and national events, improving media and social media coverage, and collecting participant feedback after each rural dialogue.