Zambia & Malawi

In the area of education, the Zambia Region runs six schools. These include three secondary Schools namely: Chikuni Girls, Roma Girls and Caritas Convent.

Three Primary Schools: Shimungalu Co-Education (Grades 1-9), Mary Aikenhead (Grades 1-7) and Roma Primary (Grades 1-7). In addition, two Early Childhood, care, development and Education (ECE) – Pre-Schools: Shimungalu and Mary Aikenhead.

In all these schools with the exception of Shimugalu, the focus is the girl child given that the levels of illiteracy are higher among females mainly due to poverty and the belief that females will be taken care of by men if they did not get an education.

According to the Zambian Education Policy, “Educating Our Future - 1996” the aims and goals of education in Zambia is the promotion of the “full and well-rounded development of the physical, intellectual, social, affective, moral and spiritual qualities of all students so that each can develop into a complete person for his or her own personal fulfilment and good of the Society.”  Sisters make every effort to bring out integral human development as comprehensively expressed in the policy but not without challenges. This is supported by The Education Act, 2011 [No. 23 of 2011]. It is important to note that, each government of the day revises certain aspects of the policy to suit their Mandate through Acts for instance the Free Education Policy of 2022 by the New Dawn Government.

One of the concerns raised is that minimal attention had been paid to the teaching of Religious Education in our schools which is intended to provide a value base for the pupils.  Little time is allocated to this subject and the emphasis for many teachers is on passing examinations.  The sisters work closely with the Zambia Conference of Catholic Bishops Education Secretary and Curriculum Development Centre in reviewing the 2013 Curriculum.

Pastoral Work is cardinal to our way of life and visiting the sick poor still remains a great part of it. Other Pastoral ministries include but not limited to:

• Visiting out-stations
• Organising catechetical programmes
• Helping parishioners develop their spiritual lives
• Skills training
• Water and sanitation development
• Women and youth empowerment
• Coordinating Catholic Health Facilities
• Home-Based Care
• Enhancing food security programmes

Spiritual guidance is offered to different groups such as Small Christian Communities, prayer guides, legionaries, the sick poor, and people with disabilities. Training is also offered for those who wish to be Spiritual Directors.

Our sisters are involved in advocacy work as well as service-provision ministries. Advocacy involves a call for structural change. Keeping in mind that the well-being of many poor people depends on fairness within institutions, sisters work closely with faith-based organisations and other civil society groups in the field of development to influence policy. Areas of focus in this regard are the formation of Christian Communities in the Social Teaching of the Church, promoting human rights, especially Economic, Social and Cultural Rights essential for human development and contributing to the constitutional issues raised as Zambia is currently working towards coming up with a constitution to stand the test of time.

In relation to issues of social justice, in Zambia, the Sisters of Charity are involved in addressing human trafficking, the safeguarding of vulnerable persons and a campaign on Access to Information Law. In regard to human trafficking, they are a Lead member of Talitha Kum Zambia, (TAKUZA), a Network of 45 Religious Women Congregations and collaborators working to end human trafficking. The Sisters are also running a Project to reduce vulnerability to sexual abuse, child pregnancies and child marriage in Shiwang’andu in more than 100 villages, under Dialogue for Development.

The Region is part of the Civil Society Coalition campaigning for Zambia to enact an Access to Information Law which is significant for transparency and accountability.

The Zambia/Malawi Region runs one (1) hospital and one (1) Rural Health facility. These are in the Southern and Northern Provinces (Chikuni Mission Hospital and Mulanga Rural Health Centre). Some of our sisters, however, work in government Hospitals.

One major challenge faced in this apostolate is limited resources as the government does not allocate much to these clinics though the demand is often high. Enough resources would mean better delivery services. Often there is a lack of transport and insufficient power systems and inadequate human resources which attracts work among the limited staff. In all these patients are provided with quality medical care within limited resources.