The Sunday Mail
CHIPAWO Girl Power will this week go to Gaborone, Botswana to perform at the Chipawo Arts Festival, which runs from August 28 to 31.
The group comprises of 15 girls selected from various Chipawo centres so as to encourage the participation of females in arts.
They will present a play entitled “Who is a Child?”
Chipawo manager Chipo Basopo said her organisation, although, it works with all children regardless of gender, always took pride in running programmes that empowered girls.
Basopo said of “Who is a Child?”: “The production brings out real life experiences that most girl children face in their day-to-day lives.
“These challenges provoked the girls to ask, ‘Who is a child?’
“This came as a result of the nature of abuses they face and the kind of treatment they get from their various societies, which do not regard them as children through depriving them basic rights such as education and forced or early marriages.
“The girls will perform on August 29 at Little Theatre — Botswana.
“Apart from the festival presentation, they will also have the opportunity to have an exchange workshop with girls from Chipabo, the Botswana arm of Chipawo.”
Girl Power was established in 2003 and has participated in numerous programmes, including participatory theatre; and communication on gender, and HIV and Aids in partnership with Unicef, the National Aids Council and the European Union.
Children Association of Performing Arts Botswana “Chipabo” is an NGO established in September 2012, which runs the same programme as Chipawo Zimbabwe and is under Chipawo World.
Other countries at the Botswana festival include Namibia, Swaziland, South Africa and Zambia.
