Moma Sandrine

My project ensured the enrollment of three young ladies into the vocational training centre Up-Station Bamenda. It followed with each of them receiving a sewing machine from the Centre. Thanks to their training and the machine gifted to each of them, they have become entrepreneurial, earning their keep. Now, each of them takes care of their basic needs and as they mature and flourish in their trade, they would be able to do more for themselves or even for others. Their being able to take care of their own basic need entails that their chances of exposure to GBV are generally forestalled or significantly reduced.

The three girls became the springboard for me to sensitize more people about GBV, the necessity for them to speak out, and the secure livelihood channel for breaking the vicious cycle. It has been an amazing experience and I look forward to greater opportunities to expand and deepen my engagement in this fight. Nkumu Fed Fed, through its European Union-sponsored project “Stop Violence Now against Women and Girls” sprung me up in this exercise. It allowed me to put my leadership potential to practice and I will remain forever grateful for this wonderful initiation into a transforming cause.

The major feedback I have received is that more and more women are now speaking up and against GBV. They are making major decisions on issues that relate to their well-being. Some have been able to talk their battering partners out of GBV and a few have gathered enough courage and taken responsibility for their own lives by walking out of GBV circumstances.

I highly appreciate and recommend that this project be continued, clearly noticing that it is forever going to enable mentees to do a lot more than they have already done this far. For greater public sensitization will change the narratives around Gender-Based Violence.

humiliation.  So, raising their self-confidence and alerting them to revert to a positive mindset was the multifaceted target of the project.

The process is ongoing. Particularly, there are five women whose mindsets I am tracking and trying to boost. The impact is already being felt as the market-gardening women testify to being able to free themselves from violence at home, most of which was tagged to issues of finance. The women’s financial improvement has done the magic, giving them greater self-confidence along with their financial independence. This has kept them from making financial requests from their partners, which usually tended to start up verbal and even physical violence from their spouses.

It came to me as a discovery and a major opportunity for which I am most grateful to Nkumu Fed Fed and the opportunity to be part of the solution to the evil which is rocking my community. By allowing me to serve humanity in this domain, Nkumu Fed Fed gave me the platform and springboard from which to leverage and ride high. Thanks to this opportunity, the immediate feedback from my endeavours are pouring in from in and out of Bamenda on the impact of the initiative. I now have a series of links posted to me from diverse sources requesting me to apply and get into various community service programs. Most of them come with the assurance that I have an excellent chance of being selected, thanks to that singular initiative.