Chikondi Kasambara

That there are parents who can abandon their biological children is neither imaginary nor comic – and the emotional, mental and psychological aftereffects of such action can be enormous as the abandonment lives the child vulnerable to developing low self-esteem. While on duty in Mulanje at Nkando Market to be specific, I bumped into a two year-old child abandoned by his mother and loitering around for survival. The child ’s mother is a prostitute. It is after interviewing the woman who abandoned the child that i discovered that she resorted to prostitution when she run away from an abusive husband who is a minibus driver. The woman, Esnarth Ntala had been suffering in the hands of the husband for years where among others she was physically and financially abused.After she abandoned her matrimonial home leaving behind her 2 kids, she went to her home village where she left her 1 year old son Jack with her blind grandmother and ventured into prostitution. After being cautioned by police, she took her son with her to Mulanje where she completely deserted her son who was now two years old. At 2 years old, Jack fetches food and shelter for himself and has to fight for his own survivor. Jack's health was at risk because he lacked nutritious food as he was picking food stuffs from rubbish bins or getting food from food vendors in the market and resorting to crying as a gymic to pursue for charity. Jack was unconsciously preparing himself for a doomed future as he had no one to guide him about education.On the broader picture this was a motivation because this is just an example of how grave gender based violence can affect victims, relatives, the society and the community at large as evidenced from the effects of Esnarth's abusive husband, which resulted in Jack become destitute and thus exposing him to such health risks and malnutrition and skin diseases besides denying him access to education.Thus to me Gender Based Violence presents itself as a burden to the society a blind old woman is tasked the responsibility of caring for a one year old child and also the reason why Esnarth ventured into prostitution and risking her life.It is apparent in this scenario that Jack's father violates Jack's right to life, right to education and right to good health in the same way he also violates Esnarth's right to good health as well as tasking Esnarths' blind grandmother.