Government says it will launch the first ever national strategy and guidelines on child participation in the country in September this year.

The Director of Child Affairs and Development in the Ministry of Gender and Social Welfare, McKnight Kalanda, confirmed to YFM.

Kalanda said the absence of a well-defined strategy and guidelines on child participation has for a very long time affected the implementation of the sector.

He said the strategy which is currently at an advanced stage, will help ensure that children are involved and their voices heard on various developmental endeavours in the country.

“We have been operating without a well-defined strategy on child participation and this really affected the work and the outcome because everyone was operating anyhow,” said Kalanda.

“With the strategy, government will be able to take into account all the issues and concerns raised by children and this will help to inform our programming and find best approaches to deal with the issues.”

The strategy and guidelines have among other things pointed out and defined child parliaments and children corners as some of the platforms that will be invested in to promote child participation.