The local level is actively making efforts towards strengthening the child protection system

CWISH has been continuously working with Tokha Municipality to strengthen the child protection system and make it functional. Tokha municipality is sensitive towards the issue of children and is actively moving ahead to make the system well-functioning. "CWISH supported for development of Tokha Municipality's Child Rights Protection and Child Labor Prevention Strategy Action Plan (2081-085), where we were able to gather the opinions of children through meaningful participation of children,” says Nirmala Regmi, Child Welfare Officer and Section Head of Tokha Municipality. CWISH also contributed to preparing a roster of the CSOs working in the field of children's rights within the municipality, provisioned under the Children’s Act. The discussion was initiated during the LCRC meeting. After the preparation of the roster, review meetings are held every 6 months.

Besides regular meetings and lobbying with the municipality, CWISH also supported conducting public hearings in Ward No. 10 of Tokha Municipality to make the elected representatives accountable for the issue of children. During this event, children involved in the child club member interacted with ward representatives and expressed their queries and questions related to their rights. Macha Kaji Maharjan, Ward President of Tokha Municipality Ward No. 10, recalled the queries of children during the event and said, "I had committed to managing the local book called 'Our Tokha' to our children as the issues were raised during the public hearing. After a discussion with the executive committee, the book has been dispatched on time to the children.

Nirmala remembers the initial days being associated with the organization. She said, “CWISH also supported the reformation of a Child Club in Manohar Secondary School. Among the members, 90 % of the members were children engaged in domestic labor. Ward no. 10 is more vulnerable as a greater number of children are in labor work. So, this was the reason to request CWISH to work in this ward”.

CWISH also supported to organization “Children with Local Representatives,” which was requested by the child club network. During this event, local representatives expressed their commitment to being sensitive and responsible towards children's issues by signing the 9-point commitment flex. To sensitize the local representatives and officials, it has been placed in respective wards and municipality offices, which compels the elected representatives to meet its requirements. Besides these, the child club network is engaged in its capacity enhancement towards the issues of child protection and participation.

Expecting further support in future days from CWISH, Nirmala expresses, “Tokha municipality is also moving ahead for initiating data collection of child domestic laborers so that we can plan further activities accordingly and declare CL free local level. For this, technical support is expected from CWISH as it is an expert organization to address the issue of domestic child labor”.