Factors Influencing the Effectiveness of NPA-VAWC Services in Meru District Council

Violence against children is a serious human rights defilement, development and public health issue in many parts of the world including Tanzania and its consequences can be devastating. This study analyzed the factors influencing the effectiveness of NPA-VAWC services in Meru District Council. An exploratory mixed research design was used to sample 150 parents through convenience sampling procedure and purposive sampling technique was used for Key Informants. Data collection methods involved questionnaire survey and interviews and data were analyzed by using binary logistic regression. The study found that factors influencing the implementation of NPA-VAWC are corruption, traditions, norms and values, inadequate awareness of children’ s rights, income poverty and lack of awareness of the NPA-VAWC services. The study concludes that practices of corruption, bad traditions, norms and values in the study area, awareness on children rights, income poverty in the community as well as awareness of stakeholders on the operation of NPA-VAWC are important variables on the effective implementation of NPA-VAWC. It is recommended that Government and stakeholders related to child matters should upscale child protection and advocacy interventions to address child risks and violence by putting emphasis on behavioral change because child protection is a behavioral change process. Also, economic empowerment should be prioritized to communities to build economic capacity that will enable them to tackle all issues related violence.