Theater for Development: A fresh shift from the never ending awareness & sensitization “trainings”!

By
It’s an excessively hot and dusty mid Monday morning in Namutumba District – Busiki LRP as we prepare to head off to Ivukula Sub County, one of two others within Namutumba District, in the Eastern side of Uganda. Not much comes to mind during the drive as we head to Rwatama Village not knowing that the adage “Never judge a book by its Cover” is a realization that would soon come to full sight.

Community engagements are not tasks for the faint hearted. The results are not immediately realized and getting the communities to open up is an even higher huddle to overcome. As I would soon find out, this is set to change thanks to a shift from typical trainings in the village to congregational laughter, music, dance and subsequently learnings by the young and old alike! Theatre for Development (TFD) is a great vehicle of engagement in demystifying and addressing societal ills.

The groups’ present plays that depict the exact house hold scenarios in most of Ugandan communities. The scenarios include drunkardness, early marriages, education, boy child - girl child equality, the woman’s position in the community and general misconceptions.  This approach triggers audiences’ minds by a clear depiction of how they live as well as the feasibly direct and indirect effects of the type of lives they lead in their households, villages, sub counties and District at large.

At the end of each play, the audiences are given an opportunity to right the wrongs that were intentionally showcased in the play. Through the key learnings of the plays, the audiences are in position to put into practice what they saw or change their current practices for the better. Being that the plays are for the general public; children, men, women and the elderly have an equal opportunity to openly participate through contributing.

It is key to note that in using TFD, there are No huge, multi-coloured and well decorated reports expensively produced in bulk but strategically taken and “talk pictures” & video recordings which can be used as advocacy and communication tools which will work in same way as in the villages, at the national and global level for ACTION to all and sundry beyond the affected, concerned and related.

The interactions clearly show that the problems the communities face are self-inflicted with the upside to this being that the solutions are within them and well known. TFD is a model worth of replication and up scaling to counter the ever dynamic problems.


Description: E:\Inspirator\LRP Pics\Theatre Monday\DSC04001.JPG     Description: E:\Inspirator\LRP Pics\Theatre Monday\DSC04058.JPG
  A play on relevance of education by a local group in progress           A 10 year old child’s response to the play’s message from a school going child’s context.


“Legalize abortion as it already happens a lot under the government’s watch and the numbers keep growing and the most affected are young girls by ending their education” – interactive by a participant

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Youth Get Empowered - Economically!

By
Nawangisa parish situated in Kibaale Sub County is one of the localities under the “creating spaces for ACTIVISTA ” programme area by ActionAid, Busiki LRP.  Similar to other Parishes, the Youth constitute the majority of the community moreover; most of them depend on menial and unsustainable ventures for income whilst those privileged enough to use their small farm acreages for livelihood, use rudimentary tools on individual basis and an even greater number does not engage in any practices for development. In Nov. 2013, I convened a  one-day Activista training forum under the Activista platform at Kibaale Sub County to empower the Youth on result-based documentation, planning, efficacy in resource use and sustaining incomes attended to by Activistas themselves. The training was anchored on first component of the HRBA methodology that details empowerment. Succinctly, the focus on; galvanizing for individual and collective action, identifying and nurturing their capacities on ...
Read More »

Is Kenya steadily playing catch up to Al Shabaab?

By
It’s been “a minute” since the West Gate siege and silly me; I thought that as a government, citizenry and republic at some point in between the “heavy gun fire exchange” with “a lot” of terrorist at the then prestigious and soon again about to be…West Gate mall, some of us if not all…whipped out our notebooks and pens, wrote on our palms, unleashed our array of gadgets and took notes. Well, we did not. Rather, we contributed money…wept and shoved the entire disaster to the back and for a few days sustained the buzz on social media while waxing lyrical at TVs & radio interviews and church sessions and at our estate dingy & posh drinking dens and gossip hair-do palours re-told the entire siege blow by blow (notwithstanding the fact that we were not even in the vicinity of the upmarket Westlands area) swearing how others made mistakes and how we could do it better….if only. First forward, as a citizen I lost young country men and women who were gearing up to do great and rev...
Read More »

Why it is important to define Tax justice as a human rights issue

By
On the 10th December 2018, Uganda celebrated the 70th anniversary of the universal declaration of human rights, a commitment that gave birth to the human rights movement. Uganda is a signatory to the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural rights (ICESR), the International Covenant on Political and Civil rights and the International covenant on the Rights of a child, the African charter on human and people’s rights, African Charter on the rights and welfare of the child, among others and has a bill of rights in its constitution to guarantee these rights. Almost all these treaties and constitution impose an obligation on the state to ‘undertake measures’ for the implementation of these rights, Al Since 1948, a lot of progress has been made on many a fronts (like creation of Human Rights Bodies(Human Rights Commission, Equal opportunities Commission, etc), Courts, watch dogs, etc) when it comes to attainment and enjoyment of these human rights. However, a...
Read More »

... My Conscious is clear!

By
What has been said of me is true. I offer no arguments nor dispute to the simple facts, but they hardly begin to cover the scope of my true crimes. Honor requires more than admition, so I offer a full confession and the whole truth. For far too long I have failed to recognize my own hypocrisy, I ignored my own cowardice conveniently hiding behind a position of political compromise, and for what? To retain the meager wealth and rank than men desire. So I come before you a condemned man for having finally stood up to injustice. My shame and regret is that I failed to do so before it arrived in my own court. We supply the armies, we build the roads, and we employ the nation. Still we remain silent while our coffers are emptied and our freedoms eroded. There will be times where we are powerless to injustice but there must never be a time where we fail to protest. This being, known as individualism is a cancer growing and the only proper thing to do is to cut it out. You all know what I...
Read More »

What is Capacity Building?

By
Capacity building is perhaps one of the most fashionable, yet least understood term in the non‐profit sector. There is a lack of shared definition and understanding around its features and essential elements. Funders tend to talk about capacity building programs, while capacity builders might refer to capacity building engagements, yet organizations may refer to it as a set of activities or processes that accomplish a specific goal.  In essence, this is the process by which individuals, groups, organizations, and communities increase their abilities to:  Perform core functions, solve problems, define and achieve objectives; and  Understand and deal with their development needs in a broad context and in a sustainable manner.” Organizational capacity building seeks to strengthen the ability of an organization or agency to achieve a desired outcome. Capacity building in this area can be defined as: “Supporting organizations to build and maintain the skills, infrast...
Read More »