ZAMBIAN CHILD PARLIAMENTARIAN URGES AFRICA TO END HARMFUL CULTURAL PRACTICES

By Precious Mupenzi

• Zambian child activist and climate change champion Mudasana Ngoma spoke on the common issues affecting children across the continent at the Africa Children’s Summit 2025.
• Ngoma highlighted the challenges of climate change, rape cases and poverty affecting the children of Zambia.
• She noted that what was important was to share best practices and find solutions together as African children.

One voice rang loud and clear in the Africa Children’s Summit halls held in Johannesburg; that of Mudasana Ngoma, a 2024 child parliamentarian, climate champion, and child rights activist from Zambia, as she shared a sobering yet hopeful reflection on the challenges children face in her country, and the urgent need for solutions born from African children themselves.

“Climate change, rape cases, and poverty are some of the pressing issues affecting children in Zambia,” she said.

“We know these problems are not unique to us, but what matters now is how each country is dealing with them. That’s why this summit is so important – to share best practices and find our own solutions, together, as African children,” Ngoma told fellow delegates.

Ngoma’s remarks highlighted the deep inequalities between urban and rural Zambia, particularly the high rate of teen pregnancies and early marriages in remote communities.

She painted a painful picture of harmful cultural practices that silence victims and perpetuate injustice.

“In some rural areas, when a child is raped and the family reports it to traditional leadership, the perpetrator can simply pay dowry or what is called ‘damages’, and the case is closed. This must stop. Our traditional leaders must play a role in ending these harmful practices,” she urged.

From her own district of Chongwe, Ngoma described a cycle of poverty and illiteracy that keeps children, especially girls, out of school.

“Parents do not value education, and children end up staying home or getting married young. In Chichewa, we say manzi wamakonka mufola’, meaning ‘water follows the drainage’. Children follow what they are shown.

“If we don’t change the system, the outcome will never change.”

The Chongwe district, located in Lusaka Province in Zambia, is one of the rural areas grappling with significant social challenges affecting children and young people.

She raised concern about the high rate of HIV/Aids and teenage pregnancy in the area.

Ngoma attributed this to a lack of access to accurate information, limited youth-friendly health services, and deep-rooted cultural norms that discourage open conversations about sexual and reproductive health.

She emphasised that these factors leave many girls vulnerable and without support, often leading to early pregnancies and exposure to HIV infections.

Beyond identifying challenges, Ngoma offered a rallying cry to her peers across the continent, urging them to believe in their power to create change.

“My message to African children is this: no matter your situation, you have the right to say no – even to your parents.

“You can achieve every dream, ambition, and goal if you put your mind to it.”

With powerful resolve, she committed to being a voice for transformation, adding: “I make an oath to all African children that I will use my voice to tell governments across the continent that the voices of children matter.

“The outdated mindset that girls belong in the kitchen while boys go to school must come to an end. I call on traditional, religious, and civil society leaders, as well as youth, to join this fight for a better and more developed continent.”