Lucius gives loans to women in Balaka

In an effort to empower women in his Balaka North constituency, Member of Parliament Lucius Banda has offered loans to the women.

Writing on his Facebook account, Banda said the women were excited upon receiving the loan as it was a step ahead in their process of being resourceful.

“Today I was meeting and greeting the great people of Mangerengere in Balaka town and on this trip l handed over some financial resources to a group of women as a loan just like I did last week with women of Mponda village to start some small scale businesses. You should have seen the excitement,” said Banda.

A lot of countries in the world including Malawi are engaging in efforts that are aimed at making women economically empowered to be helping themselves and stop depending on their husbands.

Some quarters say that overdependence of wives to their men fuel gender based violence since men in such situations regard themselves as superiors.

For example, in order to improve the saving culture as well as improve access to finance for women farmers, DAPP Malawi through farmers clubs introduced village savings and loans in Chikhwawa.

The village savings and loans facility has helped farmers to access finance and some farmers have capitalised their income generating activities.

According to one member of a village savings and loans Esther Mukhova, the grouping that started with 20 people has now grown to represent a bigger part of the community.

“The village bank has grown and we are now able to lend each other big amounts of money. Some of our members are getting up to 100,000 Malawi kwacha ($134),”said Mukhova Memory who operates a grocery shop in Chikhwawa district.

She is also building a house with bricks and corrugated iron sheets. The woman attributed her success to the savings and the loan she acquired through the village savings and loans.