Project Outcomes
Since the launch of the project in September 2008, civil society members and parliamentarians from Kinshasa, North Kivu, and Mbandaka have been educated about the disastrous impact of malaria, notably that to date according to the latest studies has led to 60-100 million episodes of fever each year and 180,000 deaths in a country where every single person in the country is exposed to its risk.
Overall a total of 45 national and provincial parliamentarians, as well as their assistants and the political administrative authorities, were informed of the magnitude of malaria and the lack of resources allocated by the public sector in the fight against malaria.
In addition to this 120 civil society members were trained in advocacy techniques related to the fight against malaria. The project primarily did this through workshops and other such meetings. They were also very conscious to follow up such workshops with the participants in order to assist them in implementing what they had learned. One such workshop is documented in more detail below.
In light of the wide-spread damage caused by this illness in children under five years of age and pregnant women in DRC, once parliamentarians were informed of the small budget allocated by the Congolese State to the malaria response they decided upon the following actions:
To issue a declaration of engagement through a motion of information in the two chambers (of the National Assembly, Senate and the Provincial Assembly of Kinshasa);
To invite parliamentarians in the Equateur province to respond to the challenge of malaria by creating malaria specific budget lines in the provincial budgets. A similar call was taken up for North Kivu.
Throughout this project the media covered the advocacy and sensitization activities of the parliamentarians in the fight against malaria. Several articles were published in the daily newspaper lePotentiel and in AllAfrica.com.
As a result of these initiatives the National Program to Fight Against Malaria (PNLP) and the Minister of Health joined with ILDI and civil society members to participate in marking World Malaria Day 2009 on the 25th April. The PNLP was represented by Dr Jean ANGBALU, the Deputy Medical Director, and commended the provincial coordinators of Equateur and Nord Kivu Provinces for their technical capacity.
