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Contents
Chapter one - Introduction. ............................................................................................ 12

1.0. .................................................................................................................Background. 12

1.2. Context.................................................................................................................... 12

1.2.1. Uganda................................................................................................................. 12

1.2.3. Mukono and Buikwe districts................................................................................ 14

1.3.The project, reducing child mutilation in Uganda through a process of social norm
change .......................................................................................................................... 15

1.3.1.Aim/objectives. ...................................................................................................... 15

1.3.2.Main activities and expected results: .................................................................... 15

1.3.3.The target groups.................................................................................................. 15

1.4.Introduction - The evaluation.................................................................................... 16

1.4.1.Purpose................................................................................................................. 16

1.4.2. Aim and objectives ............................................................................................... 16

1.4.3.Subject and focus (scope)..................................................................................... 16

Chapter two - Methodology ............................................................................................ 18

2.1. Sampling method .................................................................................................... 18

2.2. The sample size ...................................................................................................... 18

2.3. Methods .................................................................................................................. 20

2.3. Data Analysis .......................................................................................................... 20

2.4. Limitations ............................................................................................................... 20

Chapter three - Evaluation Findings............................................................................... 21

3.1. Relevance of the project. ........................................................................................ 21

3.1.1. Importance of the intervention to the target group and subgroups. ..................... 21

3.1.2. Compliance of the intervention with the development policy and planning of the
recipient country/partner government ............................................................................ 22

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3.1.3. How the project has addressed the basic principles of Austrian development policy.
....................................................................................................................................... 22

3.2. Project effectiveness ............................................................................................... 25

3.2.1. Assessing the level of success of the project achieving the overall objective of the
project ............................................................................................................................ 25

3.2.2. Level of achievement of the project objectives. ................................................... 26

3.2.2. Result 2: JLOS workshops to enhance the understanding of the child

mutilations/sacrifice process33

3.3.1. Transparent use of resources at the community level ......................................... 34

3.3.2 Quality of the goods provided in comparison with the costs ................................. 35

3.3.3 Timeliness of the activities.............................................................................. 35

3.3.4......................................................................................................................... 35

3.3.5. Cheaper ways of delivering the project activities........................................... 35

3.3.6. The project implementation process.............................................................. 36

3.3.7. Human resource deployment and management plan ...................................... 36

3.4. Project impact. ..................................................................................................... 37

3.41. Direct impact derived from the community responses through the use of the
social norm process................................................................................................. 37

3.4.2. Collective efforts by the community to protect the children through behaviour
change..................................................................................................................... 37

3.4.3. Community participation ................................................................................ 38

3.4.4. Deterring of sacrificing adults ........................................................................ 39

3.5. Sustainability of the Project.................................................................................. 39

3.5.1. Ownership of the project................................................................................ 39

3.5.2. Continuing use if schools anti sacrifice drama club....................................... 40

3.5.3. Promoting community policing....................................................................... 40

3.5.4. Working groups expanding to a level of a CBO............................................. 41

3.6. Cross-cutting issues - Gender ............................................................................. 41

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 3.6.1. Participation in the individual respondents interviews of the evaluation by
gender. .................................................................................................................... 42

3.6.2. Participation in decision making. ................................................................... 42

3.6.3. Participation of men and women in the project activities............................... 42

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List of abbreviations

ACDI Africa Centre for Development Impact.

ADA Austria Development Agency
ACDI Africa Centre for Development Impact.
CID Criminal Investigations Department
CBO Community based organizations
CSO Civil Society Organization
DAC Development Austria Corporation
DPP Director Public Prosecution
DWG District Working Group
EACO Empower and Care Organization
FGDs Focus Group Discussions
FPCU Family and Child Protection Unit
HA HumaneAfrica
HIV and Human Immune Virus and Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome
AIDS
IGA Income Generation Activities
JLOS Justice Law and Order Sector
KI Key Informants
LC 1 Local Council 1
LWG Local Working Groups
MDG Millennium Development Goals
MGLSD Ministry of Gender, Labour and Social Development.
NGOs Non-Governmental Organization
MFPED Ministry of Finance, Planning and Economic Development.
NWG National Working Group
OECD/DAC Orgnisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) and
Development Assistance Committee
SCF Save the Children Fund
SDG Sustainable Development Goals
SGM Small Group Meeting
SQ KM Square kilometer.
UNHCR United Nations High Commission for Refugees
OHCHR Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights
UNICEF United Nations Children and Education Fund
UNDP United Nations Development Programme.

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ACKNOWLEDGEMENT

HumaneAfrica is grateful to the team which carried out the evaluation of reducing child
sacrifice in Uganda through a process of social norm change. We extend our sincere
appreciation to the various stakeholders who dedicated time to support the evaluation
team answering questions and completing interviews.

Special thanks go to the HumaneAfricas staff that made all the appointments with the
various stakeholders and handled the logistics of this exercise to make it successful.
Thanks also goes to the community members who helped in making the entire process run
smoothly. We thank them for the invaluable time spent to come and participate in the focus
group discussions and answer the questionnaires administered to them at the various
locations.

Lastly, special thanks to Ms. Sarah Nakintu, the HumaneAfrica Coordinator who was there
all the time during this exercise and whose invaluable support we are indebted to.

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AFFIRMATION

This report addresses the key findings of the evaluation of HumaneAfricas project,
reducing child mutilation in Uganda, through a process of social norm change, which was
conducted during the period of April 2015. This process was undertaken to assess
whether the process of social norm change can reduce child mutilations and sacrifice to at
least 50 % in the communities facilitated by HumaneAfrica to use this approach

Except as acknowledged by the references in this report to other authors and publications,
the evaluation process and findings described in this report consists o f the evaluation of
the HumaneAfricas project on reducing child mutilation and Uganda through a process of
social norm change. The project as assessed by women, men, youth, boys and girls in
schools in Mukono and Buikwe districts in the thirty communities including duty bearers at
the national and district level.

The primary data collected throughout the evaluation process remains the property of the
communities and duty bearers that are described in this report. Consequently, the
intellectual properties of any contents of this report belong to HumaneAfrica and the
communities they support and must only be used with their consent.

Phoebe Katende
Lead Consultant and
Julius Kamya
Support Consultant
May 2015

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Executive summary
The executive summary addresses, the relevancy, effectiveness, efficiency, impact,
sustainability and recommendations as spelt out by the Orgnisation for Economic
Cooperation and Development (OECD) and Development Assistance Committee
(OECD/DAC) criteria1.

The evaluation aim and key expected result

The aim of the evaluation was to assess the extent to which and under what
circumstances the project has contributed to abandonment of child
mutilation/sacrifice and a reduction in cases in Uganda, as well as suggest
recommendations on how to improve future projects.
The expected result of the project was to reduce child mutilation by 50% in 25
communities. HumaneAfrica (HA) was successful in eliminating child sacrifice and
the mutilation of children in thirty (30) communities, which was confirmed by 98% of
community members involved in this evaluation

Relevance
The evaluation concludes that this project is relevant as community members are
impacted by this issue and also the government acknowledges that this practice
exists.
At the donor level the project was relevant. Child sacrifice undermines children
rights and visiting so-called witchdoctors may be linked to poverty as mentioned in
the Bukuluki research2. Poverty reduction is a key intervention by most donor
agencies.

Effectiveness
The process of social norm change, whereby community members and key players
in the community acknowledges responsibility for driving the demand for this
harmful practice, proved to be effective as each of the thirty (30) communities went
on to design and implement responses where their community collectively pledged
to abandon this practice.
At the conclusion of the six-month period, which HA spent in each community, all
the thirty (30) communities committed to continuing to keep the message of
abandonment visible after HA handed the project back to the community.
HA completed ten (10) police and community workshops, which improved
cooperation between police and communities on issues relating to child
mutilation/sacrifice, especially in reporting and responding to this issue.
Eight out of ten (10) Justice Law and Order Sector (JLOS) institutions workshops
were completed. The institutions came together to discuss reporting and
responses to child sacrifice and the need for a recognized definition of child
sacrifice or mutilation. This shortfall in the project had no visible impact on the aim
of the project.
The National Working Group against child sacrifice and the mutilation of children,
organized by HumaneAfrica, met each quarter during the project period and
completed the re-writing of the Draft National Action Plan on child sacrifice, which
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1
OECD/DAC evaluation criteria
2
Paul Bukuluki, (2009), Rapid Assessment on Child Sacrifice in Uganda, Informing Action Assessment Report

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 was presented to the Ministry of Gender, Labour and Social Development
(MGLSD).
The report was accepted in principle by the Senior Management; awaiting to be
approved by cabinet, before it would be included in the budgetary process by the
Ministry of Finance, Planning and Economic Development.

Efficiency
This project used the resources efficiently and showed value in bringing about long-
term change within communities.
The evaluation depicted that the process of social norm change is cost-effective as
the community owns the project and is a key resource in the project implementation
process.
Future projects may benefit from a more generous and flexible budget to expand
the scope of HAs work, especially in the area of follow up to consolidate and
sustain the results on a long term basis.

Impact
This evaluation confirmed that use of the process of social norm change led to the
reduction of child mutilation to nearly 100%, with communities designing and
implementing actions which change behavior such as the use of music and drama
to advocate against child sacrifice, religious and community meetings and anti-child
sacrifice clubs in schools to create awareness and denounce child sacrifice and
mutilations.
The evaluation also revealed that, the power of community participation - if well
managed and promoted by the process of social norm change - can change deep
routed beliefs and behaviors resulting in a dramatic decrease in cases of extreme
violence against children, such as child sacrifice.

Cross cutting gender

The project promoted gender responsiveness as reflected in the involvement of
both men and women in the local working groups and workshops held to promote
the process of social norm change among others.
Further analysis of the findings showed that more women came for HA activities
compared to men. This was attributed to the fact that issues of children tended to
elicit more concern from the mothers than from the fathers.

Sustainability
The thirty (30) communities which formed local working groups committed to
continuing to keep the message of abandonment of child sacrifice visible even after
HumaneAfrica handed over the project.
Evidence showed that 92% of the respondents who participated in the individual
interviews stated that they would continue campaigning against child sacrifice
without funding from the project.
The continued awareness campaigns was depicted by a community which
established an educational, informative and entertainment group, conducting a
stop child sacrifice campaign in eighty (80) schools and several churches in
Mukono, Wakiso and Kampala districts through music, dance and drama.

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 The project should work more closely with the district local governments and
community based organizations in the district to promote the anti-child
sacrifice/mutilation campaign.
The evaluation observes that having a NWG should also be promoted by
introducing district working groups (DWG) with the inclusion of the education sector.
At the community level, the need to follow up on the communities and also define
the time of exit should be analyzed further and effected in future interventions.

Conclusion.
The evaluation concludes that HAs process of social norm change to reduce child
sacrifice in Buikwe and Mukono districts has been successfully implemented.
Further funding to scale up the project to regional and national level will be required
on top of facilitating HA or any other organization to consolidate the currently
achieved success.

Recommendations
Recommendations were addressed under relevancy, effectiveness, efficiency, impact,
cross cutting issues (gender) and sustainability

Relevancy
There is need to continue with the NWG meetings which are being coordinated by
MGLSD and this could be replicated at the district level with HA or any other
organizations facilitating the formation of working groups at the district, national and
community level on anti-child sacrifice.
Education as sector should be included on these committees.
Scaling up of the project to programme level is recommended, especially since
there is evidence that the process of social norm change can significantly reduce
child sacrifice.

Effectiveness
There is need for HA to link the LWG with a formal structure as they are currently
informal structures based on the good will of the members.
The project staff need to build and practice team work to the extent that each
project officer should have a clear understanding of what happens in all the target
communities. This may call for employing a manager or training the staff in project
planning and management.
In future the project should cater for funds for monitoring of the activities which
affected the mentorship and follow up of local working groups in some communities.

Impact.
It is recommended that promoting the participation of the district education officers
office in the project may lead to all schools adapting the anti-sacrifice clubs in the
two districts and in future at the national level.

Cross cutting gender

Emphasis to involve more men in the project should be explored since it is mainly
men who tend to give in the children for sacrifice.

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Sustainability
Funding for carrying out the workshops and responses should also be combined
with vigorous mentorship of the communities and also train them to be able to
benefit from the existing district and community resources.
More partners should be brought on board and comparative advantage of each
utilized. This will make the issues of child sacrifice to gain publicity and this is good
for lobbying for more sustained and effective intervention by government
HA Uganda needs to view this work beyond the support from its current partners
and embark on more resource mobilization to cover greater depth and a wider
geographical area.
HA Uganda and identified stakeholder CSOs should have special focus on the
Uganda Police, whose process of submitting statements is complicated
HA should look into promoting an integrated approach to child sacrifice so that it
includes other child abuses which and not only focus on child sacrifice using the
process of social norm change.
The development of more training manuals in the methodologies which work at
community, district and national level should be considered and the community
level manuals should be simplified with the use of pictures and other illustrations
among others.
Establishment of income generation activities (IGA) should be promoted by HA
since poverty indirectly causes child sacrifice as pointed out by the focus group
discussions.

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&CHAPTER ONE - INTRODUCTION.
Chapter one of the evaluation addresses the background information to child sacrifice and
the social norm change strategy, the context, the project and introduction to the evaluation.

1.0. Background.
1.1. The child sacrifice adopted strategy of social norm change
In the study carried out by HumaneAfrica (HA) before the project intervention, during the
four months between June and September 2012, in the twenty five (25) communities
where this research (Mukono and Buikwe districts) took place, twenty ( 20) mutilations
throughout Uganda3 occurred where the research team acquired at least one firsthand
account. This evaluation assessed the two year project to establish its successes and
weaknesses in using the social norm process to reduce child sacrifice.

HA with the support from Austria Development Agency (ADA) implemented a project of
reducing child mutilation in Uganda through a process of social norm change, as a
response to the alarming existence of child mutilation, from 2013 to April 2014 in the
districts of Buikwe and Mukono.

HA points out that, the decision to stop a harmful practice, such as child mutilations, must
come from within a community and the most successful approach is to empower
communities to decide for themselves to abandon the practice. Through the process of
social norm change, and more specifically through respectful education, dialogue and
workshops, community members are encouraged to re-evaluate their current beliefs and
attitudes in order to bring about positive change4.

Once the community makes the link between their visit to a so-called witchdoctor and a
mutilation which has taken place in their community, social norms can change and the
community has the possibility of joining together to collectively abandon the use of body
parts in traditional medicine and ceremonies5. Evidence shows that each community which
has taken part in this process has decided to collectively abandon this practice and this is
what this evaluation has set out to establish as the key propelling strategy for abandoning
child sacrifice in Africa. This evaluation assessed the two year project implemented in
Buikwe and Mukono districts and facilitated by HA Africa with the support from ADA.

1.2. Context

1.2.1. Uganda
Uganda borders South Sudan in the North, Kenya in the East, Democratic Republic of the
Congo and Tanzania in the South.
The Ugandas Poverty Status Report of 2014 shows that poverty in the country is on a
downward spiral while the middle class has more than tripled over the last two decades
with its share doubling the poor. See details in Box 1 showing the key poverty reduction
statistics.

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3
Simon Fellows, 2013, Child Sacrifice and the mutilations of children in Uganda, HumaneAfrica.
4
HumaneAfrica, (2013), The social norm change process
5
HumaneAfrica, (2013), The social norm change process

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Box 1: Key poverty reduction statistics and other development issues for Uganda
Statistics
Population: 34. 5 million
Area in square kilometers (sq. km): 241,550. 7
Growth rate: 3. 58%
Poverty rate: 24. 5% (2009/10)
Per capita income : US$490 annually
Human Development Index : 0. 456 (ranked 161 out of 187)6
The national poverty rate fell to 19. 7% in the 2012/2013 financial year from 24. 5% in
2009/2010.
Poverty in rural areas had also fallen by almost two-thirds to 22.3% in 2012/13 from
60. 4% in 1992/93.
The share of the vulnerable non-poor fell in urban areas but rose in rural areas.
There was almost no change in urban poverty in those years.
43.3% of the non-poor are classified as insecure, up from 33.4% in 1992.
The northern and eastern regions continue to have higher poverty levels in the forties and
twenties respectively in comparison to other parts of the country; just as poverty is more
endemic in rural areas compared to urban centres.
Primary completion rate is slow while reproductive health, maternal mortality, and HIV and
AIDS are still lagging behind and require more effort to accelerate their progress
Government to build peoples resilience across board to reduce their vulnerability to
natural and man-made shocks which is still weak.
The poverty status report whose compilation was supported by the United Nations
Development Programme (UNDP) 7, showed these findings

The decentralization process in Uganda.

According to Steiner, the scale and scope of the transfer of powers and responsibilities to
the local level, in Ugandas decentralization reform is exceptional amongst developing
countries8.

The central government

Most of the powers have been transferred from the central level to the local government
level. The central government is responsible for quality control through developing
standards to be followed by local government in the various fields, policy and national
plans development and resource mobilization among others. Currently these are the roles
of the Ministry of Gender, Labour and Social Development (MGLSD) and the Ministry of
Justice and Constitutional Affairs where the Judiciary Law and Order Services (JLOS)
institutions fall.

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6
Sources: Uganda Bureau of Statistics, UNDP Human Development Index 2011

7
&The poverty status report whose compilation was supported by the United Nations
Development Programme (UNDP)
8
H. Ojambo, 2012, Decentralization in Africa A critical Review of Ugandas Experience, Vol 15. No. 2

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Local governance
Through the decentralization policy framework, substantial powers, functions and
responsibilities have been devolved to local governments, with the objective of improving
the delivery of services and ultimately the quality of life of the people. There are currently
one hundred and eleven (111) districts, which are sub-divided into lower administrative
units namely; counties, sub counties, parishes and villages or local council (LC) 1.

1.2.2. Mukono and Buikwe districts.

a) Buikwe District
The project is implemented in Buikwe and Mukono districts in Uganda.

Buikwe district lies in the central region of Uganda, sharing borders with the districts of
Jinja in the East, Kayunga in the North, Mukono in South West and Buvuma in the South.
The district headquarter is in Buikwe town, situated along Lugazi - Kiyindi road (60 Kms
East of Kampala city and 39 kilometers East of Mukono Town). Therefore, Buikwe district
has a total area of about 4,974 Square Kilometers.

Buikwe district is one of the 28 districts of Uganda that were created under the Local
Government Act 1 of 1997. By the Act of Parliament, the district was initially one of the
counties of Mukono district but later declared an independent district in July, 2009. The
current Buikwe district consists of one county which is divided into three political
constituencies namely Buikwe North, Buikwe South, and Buikwe West. It contains eight
Sub Counties and four town councils. 80% of Buikwe district is agricultural based
characterized by subsistence production. In the area of education, Buikwe has fifteen (15)
secondary and just over four hundred (400) primary schools. See attached map in annex 1
for the district location.

b) Mukono district
On the other hand Mukono district neighbours Buikwe district. Mukono district lies in the
central region of Uganda, sharing borders with the district of Buikwe in the East, Kayunga
along river Sezibwa in the North, Luwero in the North West, Kampala and Wakiso in South
West, Tanzania, and Lake Victoria in the South with the Islands of Buvuma District.
Mukono district has specific characteristics as shown in Box 2.

Box 2: Specific characteristics of Mukono district

The sex ratio was 99 males per 100 females
The literacy rate at 79 % (of the population aged 10 years and above)
Three (3) percent are disabled
The mean household size is 4. 2 persons
Access to clean water is at 73 % of the household
8% have no access to a toilet facility
10. 3% of the household have access to electricity
49% of the households depend on subsistence farming
96% of the households use firewood and charcoal for cooking
33 percent of the dwelling units are constructed with permanent materials
59% of the households owned a radio
27% of the household own a bicycle
26 % are female headed households

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The above demographic characteristics indicate that the district; has a higher density,
which implies the increased need to provide social services per unit area of the district.
This implies that spatial physical planning is imperative and most of its people live in
households. Household poverty alleviation programmes therefore need emphasis.

This is because as mentioned in the HA child sacrifice report9 and Bukuluki child sacrifice
assessment report10, poverty may indirectly lead to increased child sacrifice as one of the
propellers of child sacrifice is the belief that when one uses body parts as demanded by
the witch doctors, he or she may get rich. See attached map for location of Mukono
district in annex one.

1.3. The project, reducing child mutilation in Uganda through a process of social
norm change.
This project was implemented in Uganda in Mukono and Buikwe district local governments
in thirty communities. The project budget is 199,268 Euros with a contribution of 90 %
(US$ 179,341) from Austria Development Corporation and 10 % (US$ 19,927) contribution
from HA.

1.3.1. Aim/objectives
The aim of HumaneAfricas (HA) project Reducing child mutilation in Uganda through a
process of social norm change is to reduce the number of child mutilations/sacrifices in
Uganda throughout 25 communities.

1.3.2. Main activities and expected results

The following were the main activities and expected results of the project.
Through workshops and the social norm change process, bring 25 communities to a
collective abandonment of body parts in traditional medicine.
10 training workshops to bring JLOS institutions to a better understanding and
agreement of what constitutes child mutilation/sacrifice to enable them to better
respond and report.
10 training workshops to bring police and community members together to jointly
tackle the challenges of reporting and recording child mutilation/sacrifice.
Support victims who have survived with medical and psycho-social support.
Establish NWG on issues related to child mutilations/ sacrifice (UN agencies, JLOS
institutions, NGOs and experts) to lobby for the adoption of the Governments
Action plan on Child Sacrifice.
Write and publish a document on the social norm change process reducing the
demand for childrens body parts within communities in Uganda.

1.3.3. The target groups

The target group includes;
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9
&Simon Fellows, (2013) Child Sacrifice and the Mutilation of Children in Uganda
10
& Paul Bukuluki, (2009), Rapid Assessment on Child Sacrifice in Uganda, Informing Action Assessment
Report

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 Communities affected by child mutilation/sacrifice (25 communities11, with fifty
thousand (50,000) individuals);
five surviving victims of child mutilation/sacrifice;
JLOS institutions12 (10 training workshops for a total of 300 individuals);
police and community members (10 workshops); and
traditional healers

1.4. Introduction to the evaluation

The external and final evaluation addressed the period from 1st March 2013 to 30th April
2015. This sub section addresses the evaluations purpose, aim/objectives, and scope.

1.4.1. Purpose
The purpose of the evaluation was to;
Assess the successes and failures of the project as well as to suggest
recommendations on how to improve future projects; and,
Contribute to the accountability towards the stakeholders on the performance in
achieving results and the responsible utilization of the resources.

1.4.2. Aim and objectives

a. The aim
The aim of the evaluation was to assess the extent to which and under what
circumstances the project had contributed to abandonment of child mutilation/sacrifice and
a reduction in cases in Uganda.

a. objectives
The evaluation objectives were:
To assess the relevance, effectiveness, efficiency, impact, and sustainability of the
project (i. e. the 5 OECD/DAC evaluation criteria).
To represent results, conclusions, and recommendations to inform the planning and
improvement of future projects.

b. The usefulness of the evaluation/target group

The evaluation was carried out for HA as well as for the project donor, the Austrian
Development Cooperation. Other actors in the field (NGOs, government agencies,
Universities, development partners among others) are also beneficiaries of the final
evaluation report.

1.4.3. Subject and focus (scope)

The subject and scope of the evaluation covered the project results and activities and this
was also the criteria which was used to measure the effectiveness of the project. The
evaluation addressed the following project results and activities.

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11
The project worked in thirty communities.
12
As mentioned in 4. 1 the first working group meeting will assist in nominating JLOS institutions for the workshops.
HumaneAfrica will propose the following three institutions: Uganda Human Rights Commission (UHRC), Ministry of
Gender, Labour and Social Development (MoGLSD) and Uganda Police Force (UPF)

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 Result 1: A reduction of 50% obtained in the number of child mutilations/sacrifices
throughout 25 communities
Activity 1: 25 community-based social norm change workshops.
Activity 2: 300 small working group meetings.
Activity 3: 75 community responses.

Result 2: Among JLOS institutions, a collective understanding and agreement of what

constitutes child mutilation/sacrifice.
Activity 2: 10 workshops for JLOS institutions.
Result 3: Improved cooperation between police and communities on issues relating to
child mutilation/sacrifice.

Result 4: Five surviving victims supported with medical and psychosocial support.
Activity 4: Locate surviving victims.
Activity 4: Coordinate a response to include medical and psychosocial support.
Activity 4: Reintegrate victims back into their communities.

Result 5: The establishment of a NWG on issues related to child mutilation/sacrifice.

Activity 5: Expand the recently established Working Group to include JLOS institutions
and traditional healer associations.
Activity 5: Lobby the Government to finalize and implement the draft Action Plan on Child
Sacrifice.

Result 6: Write and publish a document on the social norm change process of reducing
the demand for child mutilation/sacrifice within communities in Uganda.

Geographic scope
The geographic scope of the project was initially twenty five (25) communities in Uganda,
but the project worked in thirty (30) communities. The communities are all located in
Mukono and Buikwe districts and neighboring communities.

Target groups
The target group included;
Communities affected by child mutilation/sacrifice thirty (30) communities - 50,000
individuals)
5 surviving victims of child mutilation/sacrifice
JLOS institutions (10 training workshops for a total of 300 individuals)
Police and community members (10 workshops for a total of 300 individuals)
Traditional healers

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 CHAPTER TWO- METHODOLOGY
The evaluation adopted a mixed-methods approach, which includes quantitative and
qualitative methods.

2.1. Sampling method

A number of sampling methods were employed to capture both quantitative and qualitative
data.

(i) The sample size

a. The number of districts and communities which participated in the evaluation
The districts of Buikwe and Mukono were purposively selected as the districts where the
project has been implemented. The evaluation purposively selected ten (10) out of the
thirty (30) communities that had implemented the project. These included, Busabaga,
Buikwe, Kyampisi, Bukerere, Namayiba, Seeta Nazigo, Bugoye, Kanikwa, Goma and
Kalagi.
298 individuals participated in this evaluation.

b. Individual respondents
The sample was derived from a population of fifty thousand (50,000) people considered by
gender.
The sample size for the households of beneficiary male and females and boys and girls
was determined using the formula proposed by Bennett et al (1991), which is a single
stage cluster sampling. The number of clusters (c) that estimated the child
mutilation/sacrifice prevalence rate with a required precision was computed by the formula

C=

Where:
C = Number of clusters needed; in this case, the eight communities were each taken as a
cluster. Eight clusters were used in this evaluation from Buikwe and Mukono districts.
p = Anticipated prevalent rate of child sacrifice and mutilation in the district. Since this
basic information is not available at district level, the national child sacrifice and mutilation
prevalence rate of 14. 2 % was used (estimated from the information in the literature
review that is one case in every week. This implies that there are approximately 52 cases
in a year).
B = Cluster size which corresponds to the number of respondents surveyed at each unit.
d = Design effect (ratio of the variance of P for cluster sampling design to variance of P for
simple random sampling). For this study, the design effect was set at 0. 15.
= the size of the critical region (1- is the confidence level) 0. 05
Z1- = Standard normal deviate corresponding to the specified (which is 1. 96)
l= Precision required (0. 05)
Substituting these figures into the equation:
B = 14. 2% x (1-14. 2%) x 0. 15 x 1. 962
8*0. 052
B = 28
The sample size for the households was 28 household respondents per cluster x 8
clusters.

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Therefore n = 224 household respondents i. e. 28 *8 clusters. The evaluation interviewed
226 respondents which included 95 (42.04 %) males and 131 (57.96%) females.

c. Key Informants
These included stakeholders who had been targeted by the project, HA staff and other
former personnel who participated in the project.

(i) Stakeholders directly targeted by the project

Seventeen (17) stakeholders were interviewed mainly those who were directly targeted by
the project as detailed in the Figure 1 below.

Figure 1: Clusters of Key Informants who participated in the evaluation.

Central level consultations

District level (govt and others) Sub county and Community
1. LC Bukerere 1. UNICEF level
2. Austrian 1. Para legal (volunteers
2. Chief Administrative
Development advising communities
Officer
Cooperation (ADA) on legal matters)
3. Two Traditional healers
representatives for 3. Directorate of Public 2. Local council 1
Buikwe and Mukono Prosecution 3. Religious leaders
4. 2 head teachers 4. Muslim centre 4. 2 Traditional healers
5. Local council rep
5. Seta Nazigo hospital for law and (PC)
working committee of justice 6. Local Working Group
the village
members
JLOS
7. Sustainable group
6. Mukono Police
/self-sustaining group
members.

&

(ii) The project staff

The HA project staff interviewed included; one facilitator and the Director. The other
respondents interviewed were the Empower and Care Organization (EACO) and one of
the former project coordinators.

(iii) The level of significant change story

None of the children or service providers participated in the level of significant change
story. This was not possible as the evaluation team failed to locate them.

(iv) Focus group discussions

A total number of eight focus group discussions were conducted in the two districts and
totaled to thirty five (35) women and twenty (20) men. These included, women and men
who had participated in the HA social norm change process activities, traditional healers,
boys and girls in the school anti sacrifice clubs, members of the local working groups
(LWG) and sustainable groups. These in most instances were gender responsive. In total
there were fifty five (55) members that participated in the FGDs.

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2.2. Methods
A number of methods were employed to collect both primary and secondary data. This
included, key informants interviews, individual beneficiary interviews, semi-structured
questionnaires, focus group discussions and document review matrices.

2.3. Data Analysis

Quantitative data analysis of the semi structured questionnaire involved the data being
entered and analyzed using Epi info 7 computer software to determine frequency
distribution and relationships between variables. These were summarized in form of tables
and frequencies with percentage proportions and text. Qualitative data analysis was done
manually, under themes and sub themes to answer the research questions. This catered
for data from the FGDs, KI interviews, document reviews and observations.

2.4. Limitations
The following were the limitations of the study.
The consultant was not able to meet the households whose children had been
abducted and never found due to time limit, which was characterized by long days.
Most government officials turned out to be very busy and some had gone out of the
country or were sick at the time of the evaluation. This was also characteristic
during the project implementation period.
Limited time to accomplish all the required activities.
Cases of interview guides sent by email were not responded to, a typical behavior
by some professionals in Uganda who are not very responsive to emails.
The children affected by child sacrifice and the service providers were not
interviewed due to the distance and some could not be reached by telephone.

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 CHAPTER THREE EVALUATION FINDINGS
The evaluation findings are covered under relevance, effectiveness, efficiency, impact,
sustainability, conclusion and recommendations.

3.1. Relevance of the project.

The relevance of the project was assessed based on, the extent to which the objectives of
a development intervention are consistent with beneficiaries requirements, country needs,
global priorities and partner and donors policies.
The action plan developed by the national working group (NWG) defines child sacrifice as
a harmful practice of removing a child's body parts, blood or tissue while the child is alive.
These body parts, blood or tissue are worn, buried, concealed or consumed in the belief
they will benefit an individual, family or community. This practice often results in the death
of the child13.

3.1.1. Importance of the intervention to the target group and subgroups.

From the findings there is clear evidence that the major needs of the communities in the
area of child sacrifice was to protect children 132 (58.41%), to work collectively as a
community to tackle the issue of child sacrifice, 62 (27.43 %) to get the involvement of the
police to arrest culprits 28 (12.39 %), and those responding to other were 4 (1.77%). All
these areas as selected by the community respondents represented in one way of another
the need of protecting children from child sacrifice/mutilation. This was also reflected in the
research done by HA where it was found out that one child was sacrificed every week in
the country. This was further confirmed through the KI interview in Buikwe/Mukono who
said that, people are ignorant as they think that through sacrifice they can attain wealth,
healing or to appease their gods. Therefore the need to educate the communities about
the dangers of child sacrifice becomes paramount.

The respondents when asked how far the project had addressed their needs based on
their expectations, those responding that the project had promoted the protection of
children from being sacrificed or mutilated were 167 (73.89%), to get the involvement of
the police to arrest the culprits were 44 (19.4%), to work collectively as a community to
tackle the issue of child sacrifice were 14 (6.1% and others 1 (0.44%).

The two needs of protecting the children and working collectively as a community tallied
well with the process of social norm change using the workshop method with the
involvement of community members in the solutions where they came up with coping
strategies like not sending children for water late, the children walking in groups and the
regulation of the activities of the traditional healers among others were achieved. One of
the project team members pointed out that 90 % of the project budget addressed issues to
do with community interventions as promoted by the process of social norm change, to
reduce the demand for childrens body parts within communities. The other 10 % handled
the JLOS and police, which were also not taken as key needs by the community members.

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13
Ministry of Gender, Labour and Social Development (2012), Draft National Action Plan to End Child Sacrifice and Child
Mutilation, National Council for Childre,

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3.1.2. Compliance of the intervention with the development policy and planning of
the recipient country/partner government
The Ugandan Government has taken action to bring child sacrifice to an end and in
particular by setting up the anti-sacrifice task force, to investigate and prosecute cases of
ritual sacrifice (even before the project inception). The root causes and beliefs that
perpetuate this practice made it extremely difficult to eliminate14 as mentioned by Help.

Developing a strategy like the process of social norm change, as promoted by HA which
may eliminate child sacrifice, becomes relevant even to the Uganda government. This is
so because even after government set up the NWG, child sacrifice has still continued in
various parts of the country. So far the project has managed to save six persons affected
by child sacrifice during the project period.

As if finding difficulty in using an effective strategy to reduce child sacrifice at the national
level was not enough, there was a clear gap about the definition of child sacrifice. The
evaluation showed that the concept was lumped under child trafficking, which missed the
nature of child abuse.

Furthermore, there was no evidence of a government action plan on child sacrifice

developed together with various stakeholders to tackle this issue.

Therefore the need for defining the term child sacrifice by government and lack of a
government action plan jointly developed by various stakeholders on child sacrifice were
evidently key needs at the time of the project inception

The rapid assessment by Paul Bukuluki in 2009, even before the project inception further
showed the need of government to tackle this problem as the report mentions that, child
sacrifice in Uganda has been identified by the Ministry of Gender, Labour and Social
Development, National Council for Children, Ministry of Internal Affairs and other line
ministries as well as Civil Society as a major child protection concern that demands more
public attention. The importance attached to child sacrifice by government should not be
under looked as this rapid assessment was commissioned by Ministry of Gender, Labour
and Social Development.

Again the Government is a signatory to the global and regional frameworks and standards
which seek to enhance and uphold the rights of all children. Local legislation and
structures which seek to enhance the rights of all children have been developed,
challenges notwithstanding. and organ trade were identified as risk factors that have
potential to compound the phenomenon of child sacrifice with may be some culprits posing
off as traditional healers

3.1.3. How the project has addressed the basic principles of Austrian development
policy.
a. Child sacrifice and poverty reduction
In the research done by HA prior to the project inception, in Uganda, poverty and poor life
opportunities are a reality for the vast majority of the population. Interviews conducted for
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14
Help an NGO

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this research project confirmed that poverty is a strong driver when it comes to people
consulting witch doctors. Individuals are desperately trying to evade -poverty and the
frustrations and poor life conditions associated with it15. Child sacrifice /mutilation seems
to be related to poverty issues as one of the community members alluded to this as he
said that, because people need money they are easily persuaded to hand over their
children so that they get rich or sell their children or abduct others to sell to the rich
members of society or directly to the witchdoctors.

Although it should be noted that there has also been cases of rich educated Ugandans to
a limited extent being involved in child sacrifice. A further study and documentation of this
relationship would be significant in redressing the vice through economically empowering
the various communities.

Children accessing education is another development issue, with rampant child sacrifice
some parents may hesitate to take their children to school in fear of them being harmed.
Some of the achievements of this project as mentioned by the project staff of HA and the
local council leaders were that because of the reduced threat to children being abducted
more parents confessed that more of them were taking the young children to school.

This finding shows that when children are vulnerable to a vice like child sacrifice and their
parents feel that they are not safe; they may not send them to school Fetching water and
going to school take away children from home and these are some of the situations when
they are abducted.

Reducing child sacrifice using the process of social norm change is an indirect way of
increasing enrollment in schools and reducing school drop outs. This may be one of the
ways of promoting the MDG/SDGs.

It should also be noted that one of the recommended actions by the communities was the
establishment of income generation by HA by the focus group discussions. This was
because the community members felt that those who lacked what to eat would easily be
persuaded to sell or abduct another child to provide to the witch doctors than one who was
not. Therefore the evaluation concludes that income generation was recommended as one
of the ways of reducing child sacrifice indirectly.

This is however contrary to evidence from police case profiles which indicate that all
children (including those being cared for by their parents) are susceptible to sacrifice. .
Some parents (especially fathers) have been found guilty of sacrificing their own children.
Close relatives and neighbours have also been involved in some of the reported cases 16.
Nevertheless the indirect cause of poverty to child sacrifice may need further investigation
by HA.

a. Child sacrifice and democracy and human rights.

Child sacrifice is a human rights issue and it compounds in the abusing of the child rights
and worse still it often ends up in death. The methodology adopted by the workshops on
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15
HumaneAfrica (2013), Child Sacrifice and the Mutilation of Children in Uganda.
16
Paul Bukuluki, (2009), Rapid Assessment on Child Sacrifice in Uganda, Informing Action Assessment Report

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the process of social norm change by HA, is to bring to the attention of the community the
various abuses faced by children in the communities. It is when child sacrifice is identified
as a child abuse that the process of talking about child sacrifice begins.

The consultant believes that such a method then brings to light the concept of child abuse
and how the community can tackle it. It is no wonder that HA is again using the process of
social norm change to reduce the stigma children with disabilities face in their
communities.
The evaluation concludes that the workshop methodology to initiate the process of social
norm change where the community members identify the existing abuses of children in
their communities before zeroing on to child sacrifice is one way of raising awareness
towards child protection issues. This as an approach which should be promoted in future
child protection interventions.

b. Child sacrifice and gender equality

The project is consciously gender sensitive especially because in most cases both women
and men are encouraged to participate. In some instances more women participate as
mentioned by one of the KI. The children tend to depend more on women than men;
women would rather sacrifice other activities so that their children are protected. This is in
comparison with men who were often too busy to participate in the project activities.
Therefore, although the evaluation recognizes the equality where women are participating
in the project, emphasis to involve more men in the project should be explored since it is
mainly men who tend to give in their children for sacrifice. In one of the beneficiary FGDs
one of the members pointed out that she had witnessed a father at the level of a medical
doctor giving in his son for sacrifice and this was her nephew - a child to her sister.

In fact one of the FGDs representatives said that it is we the mothers who will not settle if
the child has gone to school or well late until the child comes back. In Uganda the men
still control the family resource, implying that wealth creation is the role of the men thus
making the women and children vulnerable to child sacrifice. Some of these issues like
child sacrifice rooted to deep cultural beliefs which have tended to be against women may
easily be a new gender inequality as issues that affect children will directly affect the
mothers and the whole family.

c. Respect for the cultural background and ecology

The practice of child sacrifice is rooted in traditional beliefs and a number of socio-
economic and cultural factors have been put forth to explain the sudden increase in its
occurrence in recent years. Analysts have attributed the practice to poverty, weak
legislation and poor parenting as mentioned earlier. It is observed that traditional healers
have been taking advantage of the situation. The approach used by HA is not to denounce
the community cultural beliefs but the communities themselves, understand and identify
factors leading to abusing children rights as during the HA facilitated workshop child
sacrifice is identified as one of the many abuses inflicted on children and the communities
suggest the interventions themselves. Paradoxically one of the FGDs members identified
one of the weaknesses of HA activities as the staff not being able to give them any
suggestions but all the suggestions of addressing the vice is left for them to recommend as
the community members facing the problem. However, allowing the community to decide

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for themselves that they generate the demand for this practice and allowing them to also
design and implement the solution is what the social norm change process is all about.

The method used by the project clearly showed the respect for the cultural background of
the community. One of the project facilitators pointed out that the method did not come out
directly to denounce child sacrifice but treated the issue amongst the number of human
rights abuse of children.

In the area of project relevance, the evaluation concludes that HA is doing the right thing,
as shown above based on the existing literature and evidence from the communities,
which show that child mutilation/sacrifice is a new practice in the country which is
becoming a major concern. This practice is thriving on the deep routed culture and beliefs
of use of witchdoctors to solve most problems especially unexplained death, illnesses
which most probably are caused indirectly by poverty, due to communities not having the
right medical services or the literacy to equate it to a disease. The project was relevant to
the community members, government and global partners.

3.2. Project effectiveness

The effectiveness was assessed based on the log frame which included the purpose, the
objectives, results and activities of the project. These were assessed to establish how far
the project was able to achieve these key project areas. Focus was also on how far the
target groups were reached in the various project areas.

As illustrated in this section the evaluation concludes that the project was relevant to the
community members, as it promoted safety of their children from child sacrifice, in the
case of government, it embraced the project as reflected through the NWG coordination
meetings where a draft action plan on child sacrifice which was lacking has been
developed, through the coordination of MGLSD. In the case of global partners especially
those promoting children human rights and poverty reduction, child sacrifice is indirectly
caused because of poverty.

3.2.1. Assessing the level of success of the project in achieving the overall objective
of the project
The evaluation assessed how the overall objective of the project, contributed to a Uganda
where all children are safe from the risk of child sacrifice, as depicted in the project
document. From the findings, the project has contributed to the overall objective of the
project. This has been through establishing a strategy which reduces or leads to no child
sacrifice where it is implemented.

This is summed up in the HA 24 months report where it was pointed out that, the most
astounding aspect of the project continues to be the near to complete elimination of child
mutilation and sacrifice in the communities where HA is active. Over the past 24 months
there have been no reports of child mutilations in any of the communities where this
project has completed at least one community response. Although there continues to be
reports of mutilations in neighboring communities where HA is not active17. This was also
confirmed through all the 8 focus group discussions where community members pointed
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17
HumaneAfrica (October 2014) Eighteenth Month Progress Report to the Austrarian Development Agency.

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out that the vice had so far stopped in their communities. This finding is measured against,
the findings by HA on child sacrifice in Uganda in 2013, where, during the four months
between June and September 2012, in the 25 communities where this research took
place, 20 mutilations occurred where the research team acquire at least one firsthand
account.

It should be noted that due to the limited funding and pilot nature of the project the
intervention has addressed a very small part of the country and especially that in the
districts where the project is not implemented there are still cases of child sacrifice,
reiterated the extensive nature of the problem which is country-wide in nature. For
instance one of the traditional healers from Buikwe district who had left his village to treat a
case of mental illness near the lake pointed out that there were cases of child sacrifice
going on even when he was living in this community.

In future a double edge strategy should be adopted where the interventions at community
level are linked with the whole district structure and systems so that more partners are
involved in the project. Reaching a population of 50,000 compared to the national
population of 34. 5million implies that only 0. 1 % of the population is reached and yet
there may be a further use of HAs process of social norm change in a similar manner to
reduce other negative cultures affecting the rights of children. Although HA has the
capacity to work with communities for a period of six months in central Uganda its major
challenge is limited funds.

3.2.2. Level of achievement of the project objectives.

The level of achievement of the project overall objectives, purpose, results and objectives
was assessed based on the log frame as detailed in Table 3 below.

Table 3: Level of success matrix showing the achievement % of the success

Overall objective, Indicators Baseline Achievem %
purpose, Results and data. ent progre
objectives ss
Overall Objective: Number of cases of At least one No child 100 %
Contribute to a child mutilation/ or two being
Uganda where all sacrifice reported children sacrificed
children are safe from sacrificed in the 25
the risk of child every week in project
sacrifice Uganda communiti
es
Project Purpose: For Number of community (0) 90 100 %
25 communities in responses (90) community community
Uganda to collectively designed to bring the responses responses
abandon the harmful entire community to a since no determined
practice of child collective project by the
sacrifice abandonment of the community
use of childrens body implement
parts in traditional ed
medicine
Expected Result 1 Number of reports of Evidence of 100 % 230 %

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A reduction of 50% child reports of reduction
(13 communities) mutilation/sacrifice child sacrifice in
obtained in the (female/male) number and mutilations
number of child of participants in mutilation in or
mutilations/ sacrifices workshops and small the sacrifices
throughout 25 group meetings communities throughout
communities ensuring (female/male) or the 30
that 50% of neighbouring communiti
participants in this communities. es.
process are women or
girls
Activities result one 25 social norm change (0) 30 social 120 %
-25 social norm workshops conducted workshops on norm
change (SNC) social norm change
workshops where change workshops
communities connect conducted
a mutilation in their
community (supply)
with their visit to a so-
called witchdoctor
(demand)
-300 small working 300 small working No small360 small 120 %
groups to design and groups to design and working working
implement community implement community groups on
groups to
responses agreed in responses agreed in child sacrifice
designing
the SNC workshops the SNC workshops in the
and
communities. implementi
ng
community
responses
-75 community 75 community No 90 120 %
responses which may responses community community
include: Radio shows, responses on responses
theatre plays/drama, child sacrifice achieved
dance, marches,
petitions,
campaigns etc
Expected Result 2 Number of reports on No JLOS 8 JLOS 80 %
10 JLOS Workshops child workshops on institution
to enhance the mutilation/sacrifice child workshops
understanding of the from Police compared sacrifice. have taken
child to the number of place in
mutilation/sacrifice reports from the 2nd
process and improve communities and quarter of
recording and increased National this project
reporting incidents discussion on the
among JLOS issue
institutions

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Expected Result 3 Decrease in the (0) police 10 100 %
10 police and number of cases of workshops community
community mob justice. Number of with the and police
workshops to build participants in community workshops
trust and cooperation workshops and small on child held.
to reduce the fear of group meetings sacrifice.
reporting incidents (female/male)
and enable Police to
adequately respond,
ensuring that at least
20% of Police and
50% of the community
participating in this
process are women

Expected Result 4 Number of victims 5 surviving 6 surviving 120 %

Locate 5 surviving (male/female) victims victims
victims Coordinate a supported identified and identified
response to include treated and have
medical and been
psychosocial support edited from
through Working treatment
group
Expected Result 5 Number of Working Completed Completed 100 %
Expand the recently group meetings held seven five
established working and minutes and meetings. meetings.
group on child attendance sheets The draft The draft
mutilation/sacrifice to National National
include institutions Action Plan Action
from the Justice Law against child Plan
and Order Sector sacrifice has against
(JLOS), ADC and been child
traditional healer completed sacrifice
associations. Lobby and has been has been
the Government to accepted in completed
finalize and implement principle by and has
the draft Action plan the been
on Child Sacrifice Government accepted
in principle
by the
Governme
nt

3.2.3. Expected Result 1: A reduction of 50% obtained in the number of child

mutilations/ sacrifices throughout 25 communities.
The project was able to achieve a reduction of more that 50 % in the communities where
the project was implemented in the 30 communities. This was through the use of the

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process of social norm change as promoted by HA not only in Uganda but also
Mozambique and South Africa and producing similar results. This was reflected through all
the focus group discussions carried out where it was pointed out by the community
members that they were not aware of any child who had been mutilated since the project
was established.

Social norm is the theory of self-enforcing social convention has provided insight into why
harmful practices exist. It high lights that when a social norm is in place decision making is
an interdependent process in which a choice made by one family is affected by and affects
the choice made by other families; it is a result of reciprocal expectation (UNICEF:2010).
Therefore, the decision to stop a harmful practice, such as child mutilation must come
from within a community and the most successful approach is to empower communities to
decide for them to abandon the practice. HA, in partnership with local communities
supports a process of social norm change to eliminate this harmful practice against
children. This has been achieved through community based interventions which included
workshops and three community responses combined with awareness raising material like
T- shirts and drama groups among others.

The evaluation revealed that using the process of social norm change in the thirty
(30) Communities showed that there was almost no human sacrifice in these communities
which previously had the vice of sacrificing a child every week as portrayed in the research
carried out by HA18. The same was confirmed when the respondents were asked if they
were aware of any new cases of child mutilations in the community. Of the respondents
who replied 215 (97.73 %) were not aware of any child mutilations in their communities
ever since the project was established, in affirmative were 5 (2.27%). The evaluation
observes that the 2.2 % may represent community members who could not distinguish
between the time when HA was in their community and when the vice happened.

3.2.4. Result 1: A reduction of 50% obtained in the number of child

mutilations/sacrifices throughout 25 communities
This result as mentioned above was achieved as the project through the process of social
norm change was able to stop child mutilations in the thirty communities to nearly 100 %.
See details in section 3.2.3.

3.2.4.1. Activities
Furthermore, in order to achieve this result a number of activities were planned with the
expected outputs and these were all successfully achieved as shown in the subsequent
sub section.

a. The community based social norm workshops

For instance all the planned thirty (30) community based norm change workshops were all
held with the 30 communities as confirmed through the 24 months report of 2015 , where it
was pointed out that, in total, 30 workshops attended by 606 female and 563 male
community members had been completed in these communities19. The communities
which participated in the project in Mukono and Buikwe districts are detailed in Table 4.
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18
Simon Fellows, (2013) Child Sacrifice and the Mutilation of Children in Uganda
19
HumaneAfrica (October 2014), Eighteen Moths Report to Austria Development Agency

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 Table 4: Communities which participated in the social norm change (SNC) related
activities.
District - Mukono Communities Communities Communities participating in
participating in participating in the SNC process
the SNC process the SNC process
Goma sub county Nama sub-county Ntenjeru sub- Nakisunga sub-county
Namanganga Kirangira county, Namayiba and Nakifuma.
Bukerere Lugali Kojja Ntenjeru , Kimenyedde Sub county
Nyanja Lutengo and Kigombya Masiko Kimenyedde community.
Namasumbi and Kanikwa Nakisunga sub Mukono Central Division
Kirowooza community county Njogezi community.
communities Kasawo sub- Kisoga
Namuganga sub county Community
county Kabimbiri
Seeta Nazigo community
Buikwe district Communities Communities Communities participating in
participating in participating in the SNC process
the SNC process the SNC process
Buikwe sub county Mpata sub county Ssi sub county Busabaga sub-county
Kasubi Mpata Ssi Kabubbu. Nakusubyaki.
Kikoma Najja sub county
Kiyindi.

The evaluation concluded that there were workshops on child sacrifice and 90 community
responses were conducted in the 30 communities out of the planned 25. The respondents
also confirmed this evidence. For instance, 189 (83.6 %) affirmed that they had
participated in workshops, drama clubs and were members of the local working group
(LWG) among others, 25 (11.06%) had participated in a number of workshops but were
not members of the LWG promoting the reduction of child sacrifice/mutilation, 7 (3.10 %)
were not aware of the project and 5 (2.21%) had not benefited from any support. See
details in Table 5 below.

Table 5: Community members who participated in activities promoting the reduction

of child mutilations.
Participation in activities promoting the social norm Frequen Percentage
change process. cy
Community members who participated in workshops, drama 189 83.63%
clubs, and LWG promoting the reduction of child mutilations.

Community members who had participated in workshops, 25 11.06%

drama clubs, but were not members of the LWG promoting the
reduction of child mutilations.

Community members not aware of the project 7 3.10%

Community members who have not benefited from any 5 2.21%

support from the project

Total 226 100.00%

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There was almost no occurrence of child sacrifices during the project period in these
communities. This was summed up when one of the respondents in the FGDs in Mukono
district said that, last year 3rd December 2014, the community members arrested a witch
doctor called Musoke who was sacrificing a child from the neighboring village. Once the
project was established in our community there has been no child sacrifice

However it should be noted that although there are no child sacrifices in these
communities the vice still happens in nearby communities as mentioned above. The
process of social norm change is a community based intervention where communities are
supported to denounce child sacrifice/muilations.

The approach as it stands, covers a limited number of communities as this is a face to face
intervention of HA facilitators with the community members. The findings show that so far
1% of the total population has denounced child sacrifice as mentioned earlier.

The only way of creating a multiplier effect which will increase the number of communities
denouncing child sacrifice through a process of social norm change, will be for HA to
engage other partners in the process of social norm change. HA could play the role of
capacity building of child protection organizations like; UNICEF and Save the Children
Fund (SCF), community based organisations among others. This in essence will imply that
whenever there is a child protection intervention on child sacrifice, the process of social
norm change may be adopted, given its high level of success in reducing the practice.

The Consultant concludes that the process of social norm change works as a strategy but
the face to face interaction with each community requires more partners if all communities
in Uganda are to be reached. Thus the proponents (HA) of the strategy may play the role
of capacity building, monitoring and evaluation in partnership with other child protection
civil society organisations (CSOs) and government, who may also participate in the
promoting the process of social norm change in the communities to reduce child
sacrifice/mutilation.

b. 300 small working groups and community responses

The 24 months report submitted by HA, pointed out that, on completion of the workshops,
communities formed LWG with the aim of designing and implementing community
responses suggested during the initial workshops. After 24 months, 366 small group
meetings (SGMs) were attended by 1,131 women and 1,111 men. This resulted in 90
community responses designed to bring the community together to collectively abandon
the harmful practice of child sacrifice and the mutilation of children.
Pledges to abandon the harmful practice of child mutilation and sacrifice were signed by a
total of 32,937 community members. However it should be noted that at the time of the
evaluation 90 community responses had been carried out in the thirty communities of the
project. This in essence has targeted 35,066 community members.

However, the LWG may have a set back as expected from most voluntary activities in
Uganda, if there is no financial or material motivation. The LWG members interacted with
wanted to be facilitated and rightfully so in terms of airtime, and transport if they were to go
to further distances to spread the anti child sacrifice gospel. In some instances the

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mobilisers failed to get community members to attend meetings as they lacked money for
air time and transport.

There was also a noticed decline in enthusiasm about following up on the community
responses since the last activity organized with the support of HA. The evaluation showed
that HAs way of working is to introduce intensive activities and then move out of the
community. These included a community workshop and three response activities which
ranged from, community gathering, drama and music, church messages, education,
marches, debates, sporting events, radio shows showing that the exit strategy was not
very clear to the community members.

Due to the limit budget available, it was made clear from the onset that HA would have a
presence in the community for only 6 months, however, in most instances people were
expecting HA back in their communities to follow up on the activities they had introduced.
This came up clearly during the evaluation exercise where in all the communities visited
were happy that HA had come back and some said that they had not seen them for the
last 6 months. One of the key recommendations from the FGDs and individual interview
was that HA should carry out more frequent follow up as some working committee
members needed a reference in case if they also wanted more information. There seemed
to be no reference point on child sacrifice in these communities apart from HA.

There were some instances where the working groups activities were dependent on
individual strong leaders. The strong leaders tended to determine when the members
would meet. Because of some declining enthusiasm and lack of follow up system to
monitor the activities most communities participating in the FGD feared that these child
mutilations might reoccur as new members join the community and thus need these
activities so that they are sensitized about the vice of child sacrifice/mutilation.

Evidence being portrayed through one discussion with the working groups leaders or
members in Nakisunga showed that they felt abandoned by HA and felt demoralized.
Similarly some observant community members also noticed that the protection of the
children by some mothers had been reduced, because of the prevailing decline in the
areas of child abduction.

There were however many LWGs which still have the fire burning, these tended to be
LWG which have been instituted into sustainable groups which are registered at the district
and are doing other things on top of child sacrifice like the sustainable group of Kalagi
Powers Entertainment Crew.

This group has visited more than eight schools and gone further to mentor another group
in promoting anti child sacrifice campaigns without the financial support of this project or
HA,. It should be noted that many communities understood the strategy promoted by HA of
having community based self-sustained strategy of reducing child sacrifice campaigns and
can carry on with the campaign without support from HA and this has worked. The groups
which have not graduated to this level will have to be supported by HA or other likeminded
organizations so that initial efforts are not lost.

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The consultant still concludes that the number of LWG required was formed and even
exceeded the target. However, keeping the fire going is still a challenge due to lack of
funds. The keeping of the fire going seem easier in schools as there is a formal system like
the school administration to take the process forward.

The evaluation concludes that in some cases the exit strategy from the community by HA
should be reviewed so that the groups are linked to formal structures like the political and
civil service wing of the decentralization process in the districts. One of the political leaders
said that the process of social norm change is based on the education of the community,
involving them in collectively abandoning the practice which is one of the roles the
politicians and other community based groups and the civil servants can do if trained and
well mentored.

Another technical challenge was that some persons felt shy and were not sure of the
content and therefore required much simplified training manuals with visual effects which
could be followed by both the educated and none educated. This would also give
confidence to the members of the working group to transfer the knowledge to the other
community members.

3.2.3. Result 2: JLOS workshops to enhance the understanding of the child

mutilations/sacrifice process
The evaluation assessed JLOS workshops which were conducted to enhance the
understanding of the child mutilation/sacrifice process for improved recording and
reporting of incidents amongst JLOS institutions. The findings showed this objective had
been achieved by 8 workshops (80 %) as eight out of the 10 workshops had been
conducted. The workshops had been held with Uganda Human Rights Commission
(UNHCR) Family and Child Protection Unit (FPCU) and the criminal Investigation
Department (CID) of the Uganda Police Force, Ministry of Gender, Labour and Social
Development (MGLSD) and three local police posts.

A brief discussion with one of the lawyers from the Director Public Prosecution (DPPS)
office who attended the workshops said that she felt like there was nothing new that she
had learned from the workshops, however the need to define the term child sacrifice which
has been successfully achieved by HA in partnership with the other stakeholders may go a
long way in guiding the lawyers and other stakeholders dealing with the law to know how
to categorise these cases. The method used seemed similar to that of the community
interventions of asking for solutions from the lawyers may have to be analyzed further so
that value for money can be attributed to the JLOS workshops.

Nevertheless it should be noted that the last workshop HA has partnered with a legal
professional to facilitate the workshop for JLOS. It should also be noted that for HA this
was a new areas of intervention and which should provide learning for future similar
workshops with the JLOS.

Result 3: Improved Corporation between police and communities on issues relating

to child mutilation/sacrifice.
All the planned 10 police and community workshops were conducted. The workshops were
attended by 84 police (42 and 42 female) and 67 community members 68 male and 54

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females. The police and community workshops were attended by sergeants, officers in
charge, detectives, corporals, assistants leaders and community leaders. Through the
workshop HA aimed at improving the cooperation between police and communities on
issues relating to child mutilation and child sacrifice and also better the reporting by the
communities by building the trust and cooperation of the police and community

These workshops were held and in combination with the participation of the community
members and police, there was a marked influence on the relationship of the police and
community members. For instance from the individual respondents interviews, 199
(88.84%) said that because of the HA intervention the community and police were working
together to reduce the problem in the community and only 18 (8, 04 %) still feared
approaching the police.

Several requests have been made by both the police and communities to continue to meet
and address and discuss issues that would benefit their communities. HA should take up
such opportunities to broaden their scope of work where child sacrifice is combined with
other community security needs using a more integrated approach.

Result 5: The establishment of working group on issues related to child

mutilation/sacrifice
The evaluation showed that the NWG has been established and was functioning as seven
meetings had been held on a quarterly basis with the NWG members. The meetings were
agreed upon amongst the NWG group members. This was more so relevant since the key
child protection organ like UNICEF and MGLSD were co-chairing the NWG group
meetings. The draft National Action Plan against Child Sacrifice which had spent a
numbers of years dormant has been -completed by the NWG and presented and accepted
by MGLSDs senior management.

Result 6: write and publish a document on the social norm change process of
reducing the demand for child mutilation/sacrifice within communities in Uganda
This report was produced and published and is being distributed to the various
stakeholders who will benefit from the information.

3.3. Efficiency
Part of this evaluation was to assess the efficiency of the project. This focused on how
resources/inputs (funds, expertise, time, and so on) were economically converted to
results. This in essence would reflect the utilization ration of the utilized resources,
economical use of the individual resources and alternative ways of achieving the same
results with less in puts.

3.3.1. Transparent use of resources at the community level

The consultancy was interested in understanding how well the project was managing the
resources and whether this was the best way of utilizing resources for the quality of
services delivered. In all interactions with FGDs, key informants and individual community
members, it was clear that the project communities participated in the handling and
utilization of some resources. The men of Nakisunga had this to say during the FGD:

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We were involved in the management of resources; say, we received money and
sometimes made top-ups to purchase drums, tents, campaign drives, One LC 3 Female
Councilor in Goma Division complimented that for some activities, they received funds and
effectively managed the purchases of activity requirements, which she hailed as a good
practice.

3.3.2 Quality of the goods provided in comparison with the costs

Apart from being transparent in the use of funds at the community level, the quality of
goods provided by HA was also commended by the beneficiaries through the individual
interviews and FGDs. From the respondents findings depicted in the Table 7, 139 (62.33
%), were of the view that the services provided by HA were of high quality, 78 (34.98 %)
were rated as of good quality, 5 (2.24 %) were of fair quality, and only 1 (0.45%) were
rated as of poor quality.

3.3.3 Timeliness of the activities.

When asked about how timely the activities were delivered, the evaluation participants
said that most activities were carried out according to schedule. See details in Table 6,
where the respondents who were of the view that the project activities were delivered
within the expected time were 211 (95.05%) and 11 (4.95 %) were of the view that the
project activities were delivered late.

The Table 6: Timeliness of the project activites.

Timeliness of the activities. Frequency Percent
The project activities were delivered within the expected time 211 95.05%

The project activities were delivered late 11 4.95%

Total 222 100.00%

3.3.4. Limited Funds

Although the evaluation found out that the funds were generally not adequate, according to
testimonies from the evaluation participants, especially members of the LWG who were
responsible for community mobilization, claimed that more funds were needed for
community mobilisation drives, transport for LWG members; as well as planning for and
running the concluded and impending tournaments in football and drama. However, it
should be noted that the project after funding the three responses did not cater for any
more costs, as reflected in the approved budget and should not be accountable for these
challenges.

3.3.5. Cheaper ways of delivering the project activities

The beneficiaries praised some activities like the workshops, that they were done in the
cheapest way possible but maintaining the quality of the services. For as much as possible
most of the community functions were done in fields, church premises which were usually
free. One of the KI pointed out that by HA carrying out NWG meetings hosted freely by
UNICEF and OHCHR and the participants not demanding for sitting allowance was an
effective way of carrying out such activities in a cheap and sustainable manner.

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On the question of identifying further alternative cheaper ways since as mentioned earlier
the project was implemented in the most possible cheap way possible. The suggestions by
the community members tended to suggest that the project should utilize community
resources like the politicians for both financial and mobilization support. They also pointed
out that the schools may contribute to the planned tournaments; by purchasing of balls
among others. Use of local council meetings was another alternative way which could be
used to promote community mobilization further. These are possible areas for future
similar interventions by the project. The evaluation concludes that the project was in most
instances implemented in a very efficient way.

3.3.6. The project implementation process.

Although there was a change in the project partner at the halfway stage of this project,
where HA took on the role of project implementation, there was no negative impact on the
project out puts. The Empower and Care Organization (EACO) as reflected in the project
document was expected to be the local implementing partner and worked as partner for
the first twelve (12) months. EACO is a community based organization that provides
physical and psychosocial support to marginalized and at-risk women, vulnerable children
and orphans, youth and the elderly living in the central region.

The partnership dissolved after one year by mutual agreement as it was discovered that
EACOs management was promising items not connected to the project such as bringing
water sources to the community and it is HAs policy that no such assurances should be
made.

HA has come up with Uganda office and believe that the implementation runs more
smoothly than when they were working with EACO as a local partner. The facilitators
previously working with EACO took the decision to resign from their post and work directly
for HA in order to keep the continuity within the project. HA also replaced the coordinator,
when they found out that his work/life balance was difficult to manage as his family was
staying in western Uganda and the project is located in Mukono in central Uganda. This is
a distance of over three hundred kilometers.

The evaluation concludes that in future analysis of the partners should be more intensive
to avoid such setbacks as they may provide a wrong impression to the community. There
was however no evidence that the change of implementing partner, or change of
coordinator reduced the results of this project.

3.3.7. Human resource deployment and management plan

Although the use of staff as community facilitators to take care of regions may be cheaper
in terms of resource deployment, the issue of institutional continuity of the organization is
challenge. This was because during the implementation process the communities were
assigned to a particular facilitator or project staff; making each facilitator responsible for a
particular area with none of the staff confidently having a leadership role of coordinating all
the thirty communities and being knowledgeable about the activities the communities were
implementing and their challenges.

The resultant effect was that the evaluation team did not notice the presence of a
management structure where the facilitators had an overall coordinator to report to and

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neither did the community members have a clear line of communication in case they
wanted further support from HA.

The consultant observes that in future, it will be important for HA to nurture a staff member
as the overall Manager of HA who has an understanding the overall community needs and
expectations in this instance of the thirty (30) communities in the project area. This implies
that even when the project concludes there will be a staff member of HA who all the
community members in the project area perceive as the overall manager of HA at the
community level.

The issues of having an overall coordinator for the facilitators or the head of HA Uganda
who the facilitators report to, was not always evident and may be important in future to
nurture staff who has the overall understanding of the community needs and expectations.
Even when the project concludes there is a local person who is associated in the
community with HA

The project design was also a challenge as there was non provision of funding for the
monitoring of the activities which affected the mentorship and follow up of some of the
challenges.

3.4. Project impact.

The following were the positive and negative, primary and secondary long-term effects
produced by the project.

3.4.1. Direct impact derived from the community responses through the use of the
social norm process.
From the LWG meetings and the actual carrying out of the community responses a
number of actions were proposed by the various communities. These ranged from,
educating the whole mass that turns up on the event of the community response so that
the message they get on that day would continue to linger in their minds. The evaluation
noted that by opting for this type of solution, the communities were unconsciously of their
own wish denouncing the child sacrifice practice. The report for Busabaga Nakusubyaki
also alluded to this finding as the reason for adopting community meetings as a community
response was because, it was observed that community members would be, getting flash
backs on what was communicated to them and even those who went to the witchdoctors
would stop going to see them after being told about the lies of the witchdoctors. All these
community processes had culminated in behavior change of parenting the children at both
the individual and community collective level.

3.4.2. Collective efforts by the community to protect the children through behaviour
change
There were a number of behavior patterns adopted collectively by the community to
protect the children from sacrifice. For instance parents as members of the community had
agreed that the children should go and leave school while moving in groups. It was further
explained that in instances where it was not possible for a child to go back home in a
group the parents would accompany their small children to the school. Other interventions

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was that when a parent saw a child alone they had to find out about the child and if
possible take him back home among others

Influence was also evident in the schools where clubs like the anti-child sacrifice clubs
which were not part of the school clubs activities before in Mukono and Buikwe district was
becoming a common strategy. However the evaluation suggests that participation of the
district education officers office may lead to all schools adapting these clubs in the two
districts and in future this may be promoted to the national level so that all schools can
adopt anti child sacrifice clubs.
In this section, the evaluation purposed to unearth the direct or indirect, intended or
unintended positive and negative effects produced by the project.

Responding to how the project has positively changed the quality of life of the children,
their households and the general community, respondents had the following varied
revelations:

Box 3: Change of behavior by the community after participating in the process of

social norm change.
Children are now less fearful of the environment because they know they are
protected.
Children are now more sensitive and alert; they avoid suspicious places.
We own this project as a community. This is because we have the LWG that
is charged with all activities.
Childrens societal outlook has changed positively.
Parents are more concerned and protective of their children. All communities
confessed that they no longer send their children to shops, market places and
wells in the late evenings.
Children are now distanced from small offers by suspicious people.
It was also reported that there has since been marked change in terms of
attitudes, beliefs and practices in the way traditional healers view child
mutilation/sacrifice. Abduction, mutilation and sacrifice of children have been
halted since the inception of the project.

This change of behavior at community level was attributed to the awareness campaigns;
but also the formal and vigilant traditional healers associations in most sub-counties which
were strengthened indirectly so that they get high esteem in the society since they also
denounce child sacrifice in front of the community

3.4.3. Other Stakeholders involved in this issue

The participating communities also thought that this project was different from other
projects in the sense that it involved more people than others; for instance, it had local
committees; there was huge involvement of school children; and that community benefit
was greater compared to other projects, especially because the focus was on protecting
life. This was also reflected in the individual interviews as only 21 (9.42%) of the
respondents talked of government as the other organizations carrying out anti child
sacrifice activities, 11 (4.9%) sighted local NGOs, and 4 (1, 79%) sighted international
NGOs (not HA) and none were 187 (83.86%), other than HA.

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3.4.4. Deterring of sacrificing adults
Another impact indirectly promoted by the project was that although the project had
targeted children there were also cases of adults who had been sacrificed like the case in
Bukerere where an old man had vanished before the onset of the project. By communities
denouncing child sacrifice and being more critical to the information provided by witch
doctors; even potential cases of adults who would have been affected by the vice their
lives will be saved.

Negative impact
There were isolated instances of where the project had negatively affected the lives of the
households, children in general and the communities. While these were isolated, the
following were shared by evaluation team as detailed in Box 4.

Box 4: Sighted negative impact

The project partly bred some family and community feuds in Nakisunga; say, where the family
of one imprisoned witchdoctor in the sub-county - whose shrines were demolished, is not in
very good terms with the LWG. The latter are held responsible for having caused the
disappearance of the family bread winner. This has yielded uncertainty and fear among
members of the LWG.
As already noted, funds were generally inadequate during project implementation. However,
community members have been suspicious of the LWG, thinking there is a lot of financial
benefit.
During key informant interviews and focus group discussions, there were revelations that the
project had, in the early stages of implementation, raised expectations of some communities,
some of which were never fulfilled. Some examples include pledges to construct pit latrines,
plastering school buildings, providing digital cameras, and so on. The unfulfilled pledges, made
by EACO, the original implementing partner have not augured well in those communities where
they were made. HumaneAfrica and her local implementing partner are recalled with suspicion
and mistrust due to these unfilled promises. As mentioned previously, these promises, given
without permission by HA, were the catalyst for HA terminating its partnership with the previous
local project implementing partner EACO.
Despite the flaws, it was strongly felt that the project should be scaled up, not end at this first
phase.

3.5. Sustainability of the Project

Sustainability is defined by the OECD/DAC evaluation criteria as the continuation of
benefits from a development intervention. The probability of continued long-term benefits.
The resilience to risk of the net benefit flows over time. It was in the interest of this
evaluation to assess the probability of continued long-term benefits, as well as the
resilience to risk of the net benefit flows from this development initiative over time.

3.5.1. Ownership of the project

Through FGDs and KIs interviews, participants stated that this was their own community
project; implemented voluntarily; and that they will continue campaigning against the vice
of child sacrifice. For instance from the individual interviews 205 (91.93 %) were of the
view that they would continue with the LWG activities to denounce child mutilations
compared to 13 (5.83%) who said that they would not. 5 (2.24 %) were categorized under
others. Several community social groups exist in the districts and these could be utilized

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for awareness campaigns and have been as a result of the community responses after the
workshops have been carried out.

The evaluation believes that these interventions may or may not be possible in each
community, if the working groups do not find their own resources or move from the LWG to
sustainable group status which the project has initiated. In communities where the groups
have gone beyond the level of LWG have been provided with other skills like baking to sell
cookies and cakes bread, drama groups for income generation activities (IGA) and have
their own resources. It is still important for further mentorship of the groups so that they are
economically empowered and do not only address child sacrifice but also other basic
needs of children. The social norm change process empowers communities to work
together but they still need further skills in becoming sustainable so that they do not let go
of the anti-child sacrifice crusade. Funding or carrying out the workshops and responses
should also be combined with vigorous mentorship of the communities and also train then
to be able to benefit from the existing district and community resources. For HA to talk of
having long term sustainable activities these areas have to be explored and would require
more funding so that the vice does not reoccur.

3.5.2. Continuing use of school anti sacrifice drama clubs.

The ingenious use of the schools where anti child sacrifice clubs have been established in
schools is a good way of sustaining the activities. Other issues which are being promoted
are HIV and AIDS, nutrition education among others. Child sacrifice cuts across education
and treatment and should also be inculcated in the school system. The school system
gives the social norm change process chance to have an institutionalized backing of the
school system which if further linked with the whole school system including working with
the district inspector of schools and local government and national level so that child
sacrifice becomes a national issue. It is imperative that Ministry of Education and Sports
should be part of the NWG so that child sacrifice is institutionalized in schools.

However, much as HA had handed over the project to the communities there were
participants who thought that they should continue seeking knowledge, skills and expertise
from HA and other like-minded partners. This calls for HA to device ways of providing
capacity development at the community and formal structure level. This still confirms the
need for HA to explore ways of building the capacity of various stakeholders to take
forward the process of social norm change.

3.5.3. Promoting community policing

In Malongwe Parish, Buikwe Sub-county, community members argued that this vice does
not only target children, but adults alike. Because the campaign is at the centre of
protecting life, they pledged to continue policing their communities. This is in line with the
community policing concept that was emphasized by officials from the Uganda Police
force. And as pointed out earlier the project had greatly improved the relationship of the
police and community members. This evaluation notes the need for the police and
community members to nature this relationship so that child sacrifice and other criminal
acts in the communities can be addressed.

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3.5.4. Working groups expanding to a level of a community based organisation
(CBO)
The evidence of continued awareness campaigns is also vivid in Kyampisi and
neighbouring Sub-counties, where the community established an educational, informative
and entertainment group called Powers Entertainment Crew.

Box 4: The Powers Entertainment Crew.

This Crew is composed of 14 females and 6 males and has been registered by the district
as a CBO. By the time of this evaluation, the group had conducted the stop child sacrifice
campaign in 80 schools and several churches in Mukono, Wakiso and Kampala districts
through music, dance and drama. The group vigilance to continue with this work is high as
it also yields financial proceeds through members weekly contributions of UGX 500 each;
drama and cultural dance shows in schools, churches and public places; hiring out musical
instruments like drums; handicraft; jewelry; bakery; and commission from individual casual
labour activities.
Through its mobilization efforts, Powers Entertainment Crew has given birth to Forever
Nankasa Group in neighbouring Nabbaale Sub-county. Forever gets support in terms of
costumes, drums, and transport to the shows among others from Forever in Christ Church.
Expanding other working groups to carry out such roles gives a good impact but also
shows a sustainability strategy.

3.5.5 Linking with community structures and the decentralization system and
national level structure
The project initiated a number of activities which were to promote sustainability. The
workshops with JLOS institutions and defining child sacrifice went in a long way to support
these institutions in coming up with a common understanding of the vice. Working with the
police especially at the community level also created a sustainability impact. There was a
closer cooperation between the community and the police a government institution.
Although the police was already tackling the issues of child sacrifice the community based
approach was limited in its intervention and this project shows that the community can
denounce child scarified if they work collectively with relevant civil service structures like
the police at community level.

3.5.6. How self-supporting in particular is the assisted local counterpart?

HumaneAfrica Uganda took on the role of implementer in the last year (half way) of the
project period. This was after the termination of the partnership with EACO. HA Uganda
took on the role of the local counterpart and implemented the activities in a successful
manner, with minimum supervision from HA (International). HA Uganda has a country
office with project staff. The evaluation concludes that HA Uganda is now a self -
supporting organization and was created to fill the gap when EACO was no longer the lead
partner to implement the project

3.6. Cross-cutting issues - Gender

The evaluation established that both women and men were found to have participated in
the social norm change process.

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3.6.1. Participation in the individual respondents interviews of the evaluation by
gender.
This was partly exemplified in the composition of the evaluation participants; where 95
(42.04 %) were the men who participated in the evaluation individual interviews compared
to 131 (57.96 %) women. The focus group discussions tended to focus on both men and
women, and an equal number of girls and men during the evaluation exercise.

3.6.2. Participation in decision making.

It was further reported by respondents that women and men on the LWG generally moved
and worked together during the awareness campaigns. Women and men were
represented on the LWG; and in some instances the women were chairpersons of these
groups. For instance the chairperson of the LWG in Bukeerere is a woman. The local
project team also took cognizance of gender. At inception up to close of 2013, there were
two men and one woman as part of the project team. By the time of the evaluation, local
implementation was being managed by two females where each project officer was in
charge of demarcated communities. The same was emulated with the evaluation team,
where the team leader was a woman and the support consultant a male. Two female and
two male research assistants were part of the research team. .

3.6.3. Participation of men and women in the project activities.

Participation of men and women in the project activities was assessed through the
perception of the community members. The community members who participated in the
evaluation and were of the view that, both men and women participated in the project
activities were 186 (84.16 %) compared to those, 9 (4.07%) who thought that men were
more involved in the project and 26 (11.76%) were of the view that women were more
involved in the project.

This chapter showed that in a nut shell the project had been successfully implemented,
notwithstanding the few upheavals, which did not to a greater extent hinder the success of
the project.

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 CHAPTER FOUR CONCLUSIONS, LESSONS LEARNT AND RECOMMENDATIONS

4.1. Conclusions
The evaluation concludes that HAs process of social norm change to reduce child
sacrifice in Buikwe and Mukono districts has been successfully implemented. Further
funding to scale up the project to regional and national level will be required on top of
facilitating HA or any other organization to consolidate the currently achieved success. The
conclusion section will therefore be addressed under relevancy, effectiveness, impact,
efficiency, cross cutting issues and sustainability.

4.1.1. Relevancy

The project was relevant as child sacrifice had been identified by the police, lawyers and
MGLSD as emerging issues which need to be solved before escalation levels. The vice
exists as the rapid assessment by Paul Bukuluki in 2009 revealed, which was
commissioned by MGLSD, even before the project inception. This showed the need of
government to tackle this problem as the report mentions that, child sacrifice in Uganda
has been identified by the Ministry of Gender, Labour and Social Development, among
others as a major child protection concern that demands more public attention.

The government is a signatory to the global and regional frameworks and standards which
seek to enhance and uphold the rights of all children. In the research done by HA prior to
the project inception, in Uganda, poverty and poor life opportunities are a reality for the
vast majority of the population. Interviews conducted for this research project confirmed
that poverty is a strong driver when it comes to people consulting witch doctors20. Poverty
is amongst the key areas of intervention of ADA and other donor agencies.

4.1.2. Effectiveness
All the planned activities were achieved or even surpassed the target apart from the two
(2) JLOS workshops which were not conducted out of the ten. The evaluation concluded
that the project was effectively managed.

4.1.3. Efficiency
The evaluation concludes that the project was run in an efficient way. For example the
services were delivered in time, as 211 (95.05%) of the respondents were of the view that
the project activities were delivered within the time limit, compared to (4.95 %) who
thought otherwise. Most of the goods and services delivered were also of good quality.
However, efficiency could be affected by the inadequate resources of HA limiting further
consolidation of the success reached by the project.

4.1.4. Cross cutting issues (gender responsiveness)

The evaluation further concludes that the project was gender sensitive as reflected in the
local working group, which had both the men and women in the leadership positions. The
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20
HumaneAfrica (2013), Child Sacrifice and the Mutilation of Children in Uganda.

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same was evident in the activities handled by the HA like the community workshops,
sustainability groups among others.

4.1.5. The project impact

The evaluation also concludes that the project was able to create a noticeable change in
the communities it had worked in as depicted by the positive behavior change by families
and the overall community members towards child sacrifice as a result of using the
process of social norm change.

4.1.6. Sustainability
The sustainability of the activities needed a longer period especially for the mentorship of
the groups to a sustainable level. The evaluation concluded that promotion of more local
working groups to the sustainable groups level, like the Power Entertainment Crew in
Mukono district may be one way of sustaining the activities at the community level.
Evidence of the Plan of Action on Child Sacrifice finalized through the project initiative if
passed will equate to a possible funding and thus sustainability of the activities.

4.2. Lessons learnt

The following were the lessons learnt among others.

4.2.1. Strategic related.

Use of community based interventions which involve communities identifying their
problems like abusing the rights of children like child sacrifice and they giving
recommendation as promoted by the HA process of social norm change may support with
changing deep routed beliefs like going to witch doctors for body parts as reflected in the
reduction in child sacrifice to almost 100% level. One of the KI said that, where I come
from they used to sacrifice a child every month, it has stopped.

4.2.2. Policy
Involving donor agencies and local community based agencies and government may lead
to a topic not high on government agenda to be discussed and be included in government
interventions. Through HA facilitation, a NWG comprising of; government, donor agencies
and a CSO; worked together to produce a draft action plan on child sacrifice or mutilation.
This has been presented to the senior management working committee of MGLSD and
has been accepted in principle. .

4.2.3. Implementation
At community level the community members came up with a number of behavior changes
in tackling child intervention. This shows that communities have a lot of resources and can
determine their destiny and in this instance it is protecting their children against child
sacrifice

4.3. Recommendations
The recommendations will address the relevancy, effectiveness, efficiency, impact and
sustainability.

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4.3.1. Relevancy
An assessment showing that child sacrifice is a problem in the communities in Uganda has
been revealed by HA and other stakeholders like MGLSD. The evidence emerging shows
that the need to protect children from this vice is extensive, thus the need for continuing
with the national working group meetings which is being coordinated by MGLSD and this
could be replicated at the district level with HA or any other organizations coordinating
these meetings.
At both the district and national level inclusion of the education department will be
important

At community level, given the fact that HAs process of the social norm change is able to
reduce child sacrifice to almost 100%. The evaluation recommends that this project
continues at a scaled up level as it as the strategy that can achieve the reduction of child
sacrifice in Uganda and Africa as a whole.

4.3.2 Effectiveness
In future a double edged strategy should be adopted where the interventions at community
level are linked with the whole district structure and systems so that more partners are
involved in the project. The role of the political structure should not be undermined but
rather promoted as they can play a key role in mobilizing the communities to pledge not to
promote child sacrifice.

For purposes of continuity and smooth operation, the project staff need to build and
practice team work to the extent that each project officer should have clear
understanding of what happens in all the target communities. This will call for employing a
manager or training the staff in project planning and management.

While LWG; work on a voluntary basis, they repeatedly voiced the need for the project
team to provide them with some occasional stipend to cater for transport during
sensitization and follow-up; and to cater for the opportunity cost of the would-be
productivity on their farms and other engagements. This calls for the project to find
alternative motivation avenues like monitoring visits, support from local government and
other CBO to alleviate these challenges. Other motivation items like T- shirts on top of
being awareness raising materials should be increased in number to also serve as a
motivation to the communities.

The project found it a challenge as there was no provision of funding for the monitoring of
the activities which affected the mentorship and follow up in some communities. The
evaluation recommends that monitoring and evaluation should be an intrinsic part of the
project, this was reiterated through the FGDs and individual interviews that HA should
carry out more frequent follow up as some LWG members needed a reference in case if
they also wanted more information.

The need for transport facilitation in the form of motor-cycles or bicycles was emphasised
by the LWG as one of the ways which facilitate them to preach the anti-sacrifice message
on a wider scale. The same applies to HA Uganda as with the proposed scale up of the
project, the use of only boda boda transport and vehicle hire may have to be assessed

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carefully, to establish whether the project may in future require a vehicle and running costs
for better service delivery

4.3.3. Impact.
It is recommended that promoting the participation of the district education officers office
in the project may lead to all schools adapting the anti-sacrifice clubs in the two districts
and in future at the national level. This is because child sacrifice cuts across education and
treatment. The school system gives the process social norm change, chance to have an
institutionalized backing of the schools. This will only be achieved if the government
education sectors at the national and district level embrace the project. This may in the
long run promote child sacrifice as a national issue

4.3.4. Cross cutting gender

Therefore, although the evaluation recognizes the equality where women are participating
in the project, emphasis to involve more men in the project should be explored since it is
mainly men who tend to give in their children for sacrifice.

4.3.5. Sustainability
Funding for carrying out the workshops and responses should also be combined with
vigorous mentorship of the communities and also train them to be able to benefit from the
existing district and community resources. For HA to talk of having long term sustainable
activities these areas have to be explored and would require more funding so that the vice
does not reoccur.
More partners should be brought on board and comparative advantage of each utilized.
This will make the issues of child sacrifice to gain publicity and this is good for lobbying for
more sustained and effective intervention by government. HA could play the role of
capacity building of government child protection organizations like Save the Children Fund
(SCF) and UNICEF among others so that whenever there is a child protection intervention
by government and police on child protection the process of social norm change is
adopted.

HA Uganda needs to view this work beyond the support from its current partners and
embark on more resource mobilization to cover greater depth and a wider geographical
area.

HA Uganda and identified stakeholder CSOs should have special focus on the Uganda
Police, whose process of submitting statements is complicated sometimes ending up
arresting volunteers of information; a thing that discourages people from volunteering
information. This should be addressed especially that there is already a whistle blower
policy in Uganda on corruption.

However as pointed out in this evaluation, the project has greatly improved the relationship
of the police and community members. This evaluation further notes the need for the
police and community members to nurture this relationship so that child sacrifice and other
criminal acts in the communities can be addressed.

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HA should look into promoting an integrated approach to child sacrifice so that it includes
other child abuses which and not only focus on child sacrifice using the process of social
norm change. This is already being promoted in the HAs social inclusion of children with
disability project. However this will be a reality if the organisations get more funds.
Furthermore, HA should again carry out guided research in other deep routed cultural and
issues which lead to child abuse like stigma attached to children with disabilities, early
marriages for girls among others which all impinge on the rights of the child.

HA should further develop more training manuals in the methodologies which work at
community, district and national level. The community level manuals should be simplified
with the use of pictures and other illustrations among others.

One of the recommended actions by the communities was the establishment of income
generation by HA by the focus group discussions. This was because the community
members felt that those who lacked what to eat would easily be persuaded to sell or
abduct another child to provide to the witch doctors than one who was not. Therefore the
evaluation concludes that income generation should be promoted as one the poverty
reduction strategies which could reduce child sacrifice indirectly
The evaluators conclude that making these a recommendations a reality will be through
strengthening HA a an organization which can fund raise on one hand but also find ways
in which HA and government and donor agencies can use the process of social norm
change to better the lives of the children in Africa.

There is need for HA to link the LWG with a formal structure as they are currently informal
structures based on the good will of the members. This will be through exploring the
opportunities of the decentralization process and other structures like those of community
based organizations. This may require further funding for HA to mentor these groups to a
sustainable group level and also link them to government structures as a more sustainable
strategy.

Again HA should be supported to mentor and link the local working groups to formal
structures like schools which are already in existence and have the potential to promote
the reduction of child sacrifice through the anti-child sacrifice school clubs. Most of the
school structures are formal in nature and provide an entry point to scale the project in all
schools especially government schools.

Bibliography
Simon Fellows, (2013) Child Sacrifice and the Mutilation of Children in Uganda
HumaneAfrica (October 2014), Eighteen Month Report to Austria Development Agency
Paul Bukuluki, (2009), Rapid Assessment on Child Sacrifice in Uganda, Informing Action
Assessment Report
Help an NGO
HumaneAfrica, (2013), the social norm change process

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Annex one: Map of Uganda with the location of Buikwe and Mukono districts.

&

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Annex two: Log frame Matrix
Intervention logic Indicators Sources of Assumptions/
Verification Risks
Describe the objectives
of the action in an Are documents, Are external factors
(objectively) verifiable statistics, that lie outside the
and measurable manner. reports and control of the
Define (SMART) how other sources of project
and based on what information, that management?
evidence the actual allow checking Nevertheless they
occurrence of a planned the indicators might have an
change can be observed (even decisive)
or measured. influence on project
success.

Overall Elimination of child Number of cases of The Some

Objective mutilation/sacrifice in child mutilation/ implementing communities
Uganda sacrifice reported partner may not
Overarching reports all collectively
development accounts of agree to
objective, mutilations abandon the
(male/female) use of body
i.e. sectoral
occurring in parts in
or guiding the targeted traditional
objective of communities medicine.
the partner to
country and HumaneAfric
the Austrian a who enters
Developmen them into a
database to
t
monitor
Cooperation progress
to which the
intervention
contributes HumaneAfric
a monitors
cases of child
mutilation/sac
rifice reported
by the
authorities /
media

Project The social norm Number of Implementing Witchdoctor

Purpose change process community partner will sabotaging the
completed in the responses designed submit a social norm

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 Changes targeted communities to bring the entire proposal to change
projected by community to a HumaneAfric workshops
the collective a for each
abandonment of the community
intervention;
use of childrens response and
the body parts in reports will
sustainable traditional medicine include sex
benefit for disaggregate
the target d data and
group/s photographs
to record the
events

Expected 1. A reduction of 1. Number of 1. 1. Not all

Results 50% obtained in the reports of child Implementin mutilations/sacrifi
number of child mutilation/sacrifice g partner ces occur in the
Products mutilations/ (female/male) reports to community which
and sacrifices HumaneAfri is driving the
services throughout 25 ca on a demand, making
communities. weekly it difficult to
provided 2. Number of
basis on substantiate
by the reports on child
2. JLOS institutions child whether every
interventio mutilation/sacrifice
gained a collective mutilation/s mutilation within
from Police
n in order understanding and acrifice (sex the community
compared to the
to achieve agreement of what disaggregat corresponds to
number of reports
the constitutes child ed) the demand of
from communities
planned mutilation/sacrifice. occurring in that community.
and increased
the
changes at National
3. Improved communitie
the level of discussion on the
cooperation s.
the project issue 2. Risk of
between Police and
corruption
purpose. Communities on
impacting the
issues relating to
2. numbers of
child 3. Decrease in the
Implementin cases provided
mutilation/sacrifice. number of cases of
g partner by the police.
mob justice.
provides
4. Surviving victims
information
supported with
from the
physical and 4. Number of 3. Community
communitie
psychosocial members and
victims s and
support. (male/female) Police fail to find
HumaneAfri
common ground
supported. ca from
5. Working group during the
police on
on issues related to workshop
reports and
child mutilations/ process.
5. Number of the working
sacrifice
Working group group

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 established (UN meetings held and provides
agencies, JLOS minutes and feedback
institutions, attendance sheets. 4. Local partner
Austrian unable to locate
Development victims.
3.
Cooperation,
6. Document Implementin
NGOs and experts)
written and g partner
to lobby for the 5. No consensus
published reports
adoption of the
back to among members
Governments
HumaneAfri of working group
Action plan on Child
ca of any on the definition
Sacrifice
incidence of of child sacrifice
mob justice.
6. A document on
the social norm
change process
reducing the 4. Working
demand for group
childrens body minutes
parts within document
communities in actions
Uganda published taken to
support
victims.

5.
HumaneAfri
ca
organizes
SC
meetings
and files
minutes/atte
ndance
sheets.

6.
HumaneAfri
ca is writing
the
document.

Activities Result 1 Means Costs

1.1 25 community
Tasks that workshops 3 full-time staff EUR 9,615
1.2 300 small group from implementing

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 need to be meetings partner (20% EUR 23.077
carried 1.3 75 community funded by this
responses project) EUR 34,615
out in
Result 2
order to 1 full time staff
2.1 10 workshops
achieve for JLOS member from
EUR 1,923
the institutions implementing
expected Result 3 partner 100%
results 3.1 10 funded by project
envisaged Police/community
HumaneAfrica
workshops
administration,
Please monitoring and
only list Result 4 EUR 1,923
coordination
the most 4.1 Locate surviving
important
victims 2 laptops, training Indirect
4.2 Coordinate a materials, costs 10%
and major response to include workshop
activities medical and materials
psychosocial
support through the
Working group
4.3 Reintegrate
victims back into EUR 3,846
their communities

Result 5 EUR 7,692

5.1 Establish
working group
5.2 Lobby the
government on
adopting action EUR 3,846
plan on child
sacrifice

Result 6
6.1 Write and
publish a document
on the social norm No cost
change process
No cost

EUR 6,154

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 Preconditions

- Implementing
partner has a
presence in the
communities
throughout the
project

- Community
members willing
to actively
participate in the
social norm
change process

- JLOS are open

to engage in the
learning process
and engage in
discussion on
this subject

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Annex three: Consultants profile
Consultants in Disability and Development, M & E, Organizational Development,
Communication, Research and Data Analysis.

NAMES AND KEY EXPERIENCE

EXPERTISE QUALIFICATIONS

Phoebe Katende: Masters in Social Phoebe will be the team leader, providing
Adept in Capacity Sector Planning and the requisite technical direction to the
building, Disability and Management from consultancy.
Development, Makerere University;
Degree in Social Work She has previously been involved in
Advocacy, Studys and
and Social monitoring, reviews and evaluation of
Proposal Administration from
Development. disability projects at international and
Makerere University;
A certificate in national level, conducting baseline studies
Monitoring and and planning in the area of disability,
Evaluation from capacity assessments of disabled peoples
Uganda Management organizations and has also worked with
Institute. civil society organizations and government
ministries and local governments in the
area of disability. Has expertise in
quantitative and qualitative study methods
and project planning and management. Is
well versed with the UN Convention on the
Rights of Persons with Disabilities, WHO
CBR guidelines. She is also well versed
with working with gender issues and
various disability categories. Through her
experience in community based
rehabilitation, she is well versed with
working with disabilities of all categories,
gender and ages; and has promoted their
inclusion in community activities.

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 Julius Kamya: -Masters in Management Julius will be the co-consultant
Studies from Uganda providing expertise in
Expert in Organizational Management Institute instruments generation, data
Development, (UMI);
collection and analysis; as well
Communication, Disability -PGD in Management as report writing.
and Development, Studies from UMI;
-BA in Mass
advocacy, M&E. He has previously led (as chief
Communications, with a
executive), the African Union of
major in Public Relations
the Blind (AFUB) and Ugandas
from Makerere
National Council for Disability
University;
(NCD). He also led NUDIPUs
-Competence building advocacy and policy research
certificates in Project work between 1999 and 2005.
Planning and
Julius is adept in Project
Management, as well as
Monitoring & Evaluation,
Project Monitoring and
Qualitative Research, Strategic
Evaluation from
and Action Planning, Social
Makerere University.
Policy Analysis, Project Planning
and Management, Proposal
Development and Report
Writing, Human Rights
Advocacy, Adult Training and
Community Mobilisation,
Corporate Public Relations, and
Editing Publications.

Research Assistants.

Tumwine Gaster Degree in Development Supported with data collection

Studies
Nabajja Olivia Degree Social Work and Supported with data collection
Social Administration
Nabukonde Dina Under Graduate Student Supported with data collection

Mutesasira Joseph Degree Bachelor of Supported with data collection

Science Civil
Engineering

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Annex four: Tools

A1: Focus group discussion guide

HumaneAfrica- Evaluation of reducing child mutilation in Uganda through a process

of social norm change

District: Village:

Group category:

1. What do you understand by child sacrifice and mutilation/ what constitutes child
mutilation/sacrifice?
2. Have there been similar activities in your community before the project was established
(explain)? (probe for organizations which were carrying out activities if yes)
a) Relevance
3. What were your major needs in the area of child sacrifice/mutilation in your
community?
4. In which ways has the project fulfilled these needs?
5. How is the government addressing the needs of the sacrifice/child mutilation in your
community?
6. How was the project aimed at combating child sacrifice conceived and developed?

b) Effectiveness
7. What activities/services (probe for identification, treatment, psychosocial support, and
reintegration in the community, reduction in child mutilation, small working groups,
community responses, and workshops) has the project implemented in your
community?
8. How have you participated in the small working groups activities and how have you
benefited or not benefited from this experience?
9. What has been the major achievement of the project?
10. What factors have led to the success of this project?
11. What have been the key weaknesses and how would they have been avoided or how
have they been addressed?
12. What factors have led to these weaknesses?
13. What are the key lessons that you have learned by participating in the project?

c) Efficiency
14. How well has the project been managed in terms of resources and was this the best
way of utilizing resources for the quality of services delivered?
15. Is the way that the project is being managed the best way for them to deliver services?
16. How timely have the activities been delivered?
17. How adequate were the resources (human, financial, material etc.) in comparison to
the amount of work and what could have been done differently?

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18. In which other cheaper ways should the project have been delivered?

d) Impact
19. How has the project changed the quality of life of the children, their household and the
general community?
20. How has the project negatively affected the lives of the households, children in general
and the community?
21. How has the community changed their attitudes, beliefs and practice towards child
mutilation/sacrifice (at individual, community and households level)?
24. What activities do you see are taking place which were not previously planned for?
25. What is different from this project compared to other projects you know of?
22. Has there been a change in the way the police responds to cases of child mutilation in
the community?
23. What marked change in terms attitudes, beliefs and practices has been achieved or not
achieved in the way traditional healers view child mutilation/sacrifice?

e) Sustainability of the project

24. How will you as community members continue with the project after the funding ends?
25. What project activities will continue when the project ends?

f) Cross-cutting issue of gender

26. In what ways are both men and women participating in the social norm change
process, what roles is each gender playing?
27. In what ways have men and women been involved in the project (identification,
implementation, monitoring and evaluation)?
28. How have men and women equally benefited from the project?

g. Recommendations
29. What do you think should have been done differently by the project to achieve even
better results?

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A2: Key Informants Interview guide (project staff)

HumaneAfrica- Evaluation of reducing child mutilation in Uganda through a process

of social norm change

Name:

District/Organisation: Title:

1. What do you understand by child sacrifice and mutilation/ what constitutes child
mutilation/sacrifice?
2. Have there been similar activities in your district before the project was
established (explain)? (probe for the name of organisations which were carrying
out activities if yes)
a) Relevance
3. What were your major needs in the area of child sacrifice/mutilation in your
district?
4. In which ways has the project fulfilled these needs?
5. What were the major needs of the country for it to promote the communities in
abandoning child mutilations and sacrifice?
6. How is the government addressing the needs of the sacrifice/child mutilation in
your district? And how has this project supported government in addressing these
needs?
7. How is this project in line with the global priorities and
8. In which ways is this project fulfilling the global priorities as well as partner and
donor policies on children rights, and other donor agencies like UNICEF?
9. How could project design be improved for the future to serve the needs of the
communities in preventing child mutilation/sacrifice?

b) Effectiveness
10. What activities/services (probe for identification, treatment, psychosocial support,
and reintegration in the community, reduction in child mutilation, small working
groups, community responses, and workshops) has the project implemented in
your district?
11. What roles do the small working groups activities play in the social norm change
process and how has the district, communities benefited or not benefited from this
experience?
12. What has been the major achievement of the project and what factors have led to
the success of this project?
13. What have been the key weaknesses and how would these weaknesses have
been avoided or how have they been addressed?
14. What factors have led to these weaknesses?
15. What are the key lessons that we can learn by participating in the project?

c) Efficiency

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 16. How well has the project been managed in terms of resources and was this the
best way of utilising resources for the quality of services delivered?
17. Is the way that the project is being managed the best way to deliver services
18. How timely have the activities been delivered in this project?
19. How adequate were the resources (human, financial, material etc) in comparison
to the amount of work and what could have been done differently?
20. In which other cheaper ways should the project have been delivered?
21. To what extent were project results achieved within the planned budget and
timeframe?
22. What is the evidence of adequacy of available resources (financing, staff, time
etc)?
What changes were made in terms of project activities, if any? What were the reasons for
the changes? How were these changes determined and decided?
How did HumaneAfrica monitor and review project activities to ensure they remain on
track?
How could project implementation be improved in the future in terms of efficiency?

d) Impact
23. With evidence, mention any positive or negative, direct or indirect effects of the
project on the target communities how has the project changed the quality of life
of the children, their household and the general community and district plans and
policies towards child mutilation?
24. How has the project negatively affected the lives of the households, children in
general and the community and district as a whole?
25. How has the community changed their attitudes, beliefs and practice towards
child mutilation/sacrifice (at individual, community and households level and
district level (probe for policy and action plan change).
24. What activities do you see are taking place which were not previously planned for?
25. What is different from this project compared to other projects you know of?
26. What marked change in terms attitudes, beliefs and practices have been achieved
or not achieved in the way traditional healers view child mutilation/sacrifice?
27. In what ways has the project contributed to the abandonment of child sacrifice?
i.e. community, households, judiciary, MGLSD etc

e) Sustainability of the project

28. How will the district/country continue with the project after the funding ends?
29. How has the project planned for the continuity of the project when the project
ends?
30. What fund raising strategies have been instituted by the project at the community,
district and national level in order to continue with the project?
31. How will the district or the country continue with the project after the funding
ends?
32. In which ways have you as government or donor agencies been involved in the
project activities and how will this process continue?

f) Cross-cutting issue of gender

33. How has the project promoted gender equality, roles and equity in the social norm
change process?

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 34. In what ways have men and women been involved in the project (identification,
implantation, monitoring and evaluation)?
35. How have men and women equally benefited from the project?

g. Recommendations
36. What do you think should have been done differently by the project to achieve
even better results?

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A3: Key Informants Interview guide (CSOs, Donor agencies, govt staff, community
leaders etc.)

HumaneAfrica- Evaluation of reducing child mutilation in Uganda through a process

of social norm change

Name:

District/Organisation: Title:

1. What do you understand by child sacrifice and mutilation/ what constitutes

child mutilation/sacrifice?
2. Have there been similar activities in your district before the project was
established (explain)? (probe for the name of organisations which were
carrying out activities if yes)
a) Relevance
3. What were your major needs in the area of child sacrifice/mutilation in your
district?
4. In which ways has the project fulfilled these needs?
5. What were the major needs of the country for it to promote the communities in
abandoning child mutilations and sacrifice?
6. How is government addressing the needs of the sacrifice/child mutilation in
your district? And how has this project supported government in addressing
these needs?
7. In which ways is this project fulfilling the global priorities; as well as partner
and donor policies on children rights, and other donor agencies like UNICEF?
8. How could project design be improved for the future to serve the needs of the
communities in preventing child mutilation/sacrifice?

b) Effectiveness
9. What activities/services (probe for identification, treatment, psychosocial
support, and reintegration in the community, reduction in child mutilation,
small working groups, community responses, and workshops) has the project
implemented in your district?
10. What roles do the small working groups activities play in the social norm
change process and how has the district, communities benefited or not
benefited from this experience?
11. What has been the major achievement of the project and what factors have
led to the success of this project?
12. What have been the key weaknesses and how would these weaknesses have
been avoided or how have they been addressed?
13. What factors have led to these weaknesses?

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 14. What are the key lessons that we can learn by participating in the project?
15. How could the project be improved further in this area?

c) Efficiency
16. How well has the project been managed in terms of resources and was this
the best way of utilizing resources for the quality of services delivered?
17. Is the way that the project is being managed the best way to deliver services?
18. How timely have the activities been delivered in this project?
19. How adequate were the resources (human, financial, material etc.) in
comparison to the amount of work and what could have been done
differently?
20. In which other cheaper ways should the project have been delivered?
21. To what extent were project results achieved within the planned budget and
timeframe?
22. How could project implementation be improved in the future in terms of
efficiency?

d) Impact
23. How has the project changed the quality of life of the children, their household
and the general community and district plans and policies towards child
mutilation?
24. How has the project negatively affected the lives of the households, children
in general and the community and district as a whole?
25. How has the community changed their attitudes, beliefs and practice towards
child mutilation/sacrifice (at individual, community and households level and
district level (probe for policy and action plan change)?
24. What activities do you see are taking place which were not previously planned for?
25. What is different from this project compared to other projects you know of?
26. What marked change in terms attitudes, beliefs and practices have been
achieved or not achieved in the way traditional healers view child
mutilation/sacrifice?
27. In what ways has the project contributed to the abandonment of child
sacrifice? I.e. community, households, judiciary, MGLSD etc.
28. How could the negative impacts be reduced?

e) Sustainability of the project

29. How will the district/country continue with the project after the funding ends?
30. How has the project planned for the continuity of the project when the project
ends?
31. What fund raising strategies have been instituted by the project at the
community, district and national level in order to continue with the project?
32. How will the district or the country continue with the project after the funding
ends?
33. In which ways have you as government or donor agencies been involved in
the project activities and how will this process continue?
34. In which ways can the project be improved further in this area?

f) Cross-cutting issue of gender

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 35. How has the project promoted gender equality, roles and equity in the social
norm change process?
36. In what ways have men and women been involved in the project
(identification, implantation, monitoring and evaluation)?
37. How have men and women equally benefited from the project?
38. In which ways can the project be improved further in this area?

g. Recommendations
39. What others things could have been done differently by the project to achieve
even better results?

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A3: Semi structured questionnaire

HumaneAfrica- Evaluation of reducing child mutilation in Uganda through a process

of social norm change

Thank you for agreeing to participate in an interview for the evaluation to establish the
strengths and weaknesses of the project on Reducing child mutilation in Uganda through a
process of social norm change

This assessment will help us in improving the project further. All of your responses will be
confidential.
Date: Name
District:
SECTION 1: BACK GROUND INFORMATION
Sex of Age Location Education
Respondent
Coding Coding Village Coding category
category category Community No schooling (1)
Male (1) 0-17 (1) Sub county Primary (2)
Female (2) 18-35 (2) Secondary (3)
36-59 (3) District Higher institutions
60+ (4) . of learning (4).
.. Other skill training
thru projects,
church, govt etc.
(5)
Questions. Coding categories
1. What do you It is a project working with the community to reduce on 1
know about the demanding children body parts to be used by witch
project on doctors for wealth and health etc.
reducing child It is a project which has not been accepted in the 2
mutilation in community
Uganda through a I do not know 3
process of social Others specify
norm change? ...

2.How have you I have been involved in a number of workshops and I am 1
been supported by now a member of a working group promoting the
the project on reduction of child mutilations.
reducing child I have been involved in a number of workshops and I am 2
mutilation in not a member any working group promoting the reduction
Uganda of child mutilations.
I am not aware of the project 3
I am have not benefited from any support from the project 4
Others specify
.............

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 ..

Relevancy.
3. What were your To protect the children 1
major needs in the To get the involvement of police and the lawyers to 2
area of child prosecute the culprits
sacrifice/mutilation To work collectively as a community to tackle the issue of 3
in your district? child sacrifice
Others specify.
..

4. In which ways The children are protected 1

has the project The police and the lawyers are prosecuting the culprits 2
fulfilled these We are working collectively as a community to tackle the 3
needs? issue of child mutilations.

5. How is Government workers are more involved in addressing 1

government child mutilations than before
addressing the The government workers are still not interested in 2
needs of the protecting families affected by child mutilation
sacrifice/child Others 3
mutilation in your specify
district?

Give reasons for your answer.

6. How well has The project resources have been used for the planned 1
the project been purpose
managed in terms The project resources have been misused. 2
of resources? I have no idea about the project resources 3
Others specify 4
Give reason for your answer.

7.Was this the This was the best way of utilizing the resources as the 1
best way of prices used were competitive with other prices
utilizing resources This was not the best way of utilizing the resources as the 2
for the quality of prices used were not competitive with other prices
services delivered Other specify 3
Give reasons for your answer
Effectiveness
8. How has your I feel safe with my children as I no longer fear that they 1
life changed will be mutilated
because of the

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 project support My life has not changed at all I am still looked down upon 2
by the community or by my school mates.
Others specify
Give reasons for your answer.

9. .How frequently One child every week 1

do you hear that a One child every two weeks 2
child has been One child every three weeks 3
sacrificed in your One child every four weeks 4
community Others specify 5

10. Have you or Yes

one of your family 1
members signed No 2
the pledge to
abandon the
harmful practice of
child mutilation/
sacrifice.

11. In which ways We now work together to reduce this problem in the 1
has the project community
promoted the We fear approaching the police so we do not work 2
improvement of together to address this problem of child sacrifice
the relationship
between the
project and police
in addressing the
issues of child
mutilation/sacrifice
?
Others specify 3

12. Are you aware Yes 1

of any family No 2
affected by
mutilation
/sacrifice in your
community which
has not been
identified by the
project
Efficiency
14. How would I would rate them as of high quality 1
you rate the I would rate them as of good quality 2
quality of services I would rate them as of fair quality 3
provided I would rate them as of poor quality 4

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 Give reasons for your answer

15. How well has The project resources have been used for the planned 1
the project been purpose
managed in terms The project resources have been misused. 2
of resources? I have no idea about the project resources 3
Others specify
Give reason for your answer.

16. Was this the This was the best way of utilizing the resources as the 1
best way of prices used were competitive with other prices
utilizing resources This was not the best way of utilizing the resources as the 2
for the quality of prices used were not competitive with other prices
services delivered Other specify
Give reasons for your answer
Impact.
17. How has the We as the community now feel safe 1
project changed The situation is still the same 2
the quality of life of The situation of child mutilations is worse 3
the children, their Give reasons for your answers
household towards
child mutilation?

18. Do you think No because we work together 1

that traditional Iam not sure as I feel that some traditional healers have 2
healers are still not changed their ways
capable of Yes they are still capable of abducting the children 3
abducting children Others specify 4
for mutilation
Give reasons for your answer.

19. How frequently Any suspected action on child mutilation the police comes 1
have you heard to support
the police talk Any suspected action on child mutilation the police does 2
about child not help
mutilations
Others specify
Give reasons for your answer

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Sustainability of the project
20. How will you We shall continue with the working groups to denounce 1
continue with the child mutilations
project when the We shall not continue with the working groups 2
funding ends as a Others specify
community with Give reasons for your answer
fighting child
mutilations

21. What other The government is educating us 1

organizations are Local NGOs are educating us 2
involved in child International NGO (not HA) are supporting us
mutilations in your Mention the organisations
community

22. Are women Yes we all participate equally in the project 1

and men No men are more involved in the project 2
participating No women are more involved in the project 3
equally in the Give reasons for your answer
project activities?

Any learning from the project experience

Any recommendations

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A3E: Guidance on Collecting MSC Stories

What is the Most Significant Change Stories Approach?

The Most Significant Change (MSC) technique is a method of participatory evaluation that
involves the collection of significant change stories at different levels of the intervention
(e.g. Community Development Officer, elders seeing the change in social norm, a child
affected by mutilations and households whose children were mutilated etc) and collectively
selecting the Most Significant Change Stories based on the selected themes (called
domains). The domains reflect broad categories, as well as lessons learned.
In this particular evaluation process, we anticipate that the stories that we collect will
demonstrate how the reducing of child mutilation through a process of social norm have
positively impacted on the lives of the people with Uncorrected Refractive Errors, their
family members and communities as participants in the project.
It is anticipated that your project has made significant changes and these will be classified
under the following change themes/domains:
a) Reduction in child mutilation
b) Role of communities

Key Steps in Conducting MSC Stories

As you might be aware, we intend to use the MSC Stories approach to gather change
stories for NUIRE Project across the 4 districts of Wakiso, Yumbe, Moyo and Arua. Please
follow the steps below to support this initiative which will be very useful for the process.

Step 1 - Collect Significant Change Stories

The stories that will be collected should be able to demonstrate some significant
changes in their lives of the story tellers. The stories will be presented in first person
singular, that is as they are told. The due dates for the submission of the type written
Significant Change stories should be communicated to the beneficiaries. However, you
do not have to wait for the last day to get the stories.
1.1 The Story Collectors: It is ideal to work with people who have knowledge of local
language and with good listening/interviewing and writing skills, e.g. the research
assiatnts who are from the community as well as Individuals who have received project
services. The process starts by asking some simple questions of the people supported
through the project:
1.2 The Story Tellers: You are requested to collect stories from those who have benefitted,
supported or known of the changes that have taken place as a result of the project. It is
useful to get the stories from a range of stakeholders since they bring in different
perspectives. The potential people you may consider are :
a. Case of a child who survived child mutilation

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 b. Community development officer
c. Households which have been affected by child mutilations.
d. A member in the working community groups etc.
e. Other community members men, community leaders etc.
1.3 The Key Questions: The template to be used is attached and each story should clearly
highlight the following three key questions:
a. What do you consider as the most significant changes that happened since the
initiative started?
b. Of all those changes, which one do you consider to have been the most
Significant Changes? (Please note that people always have a tendency to share
several changes, which is great to capture in your report. But after all that, we
need them to personally tell you what is their MOST SIGNIFICANT CHANGE
and WHY?)
c. Why is this change significant for you?

Step 2 Establish the decision makers / story selectors

Identify and assemble the people who will help select stories that they consider as most
significant. These decision-makers could be at any level in the organisation, in any
location.
Step 3 Select the Most Significant Change Stories
The decision making team will conduct a discussion to choose/select a few most
significant change stories. In fact, we encourage the group to read each story and then
agree the theme to which they allocate the stories and why. In our instance, we wish to
gather a collection of stories that will demonstrate the following themes
Step 4 Collate some type written copies of the selected MSC Stories
Type the selected stories (maximum 5 stories per change theme as stated above). We will
need several of them printed so that we can share with the Project stakeholders.

Step 5 What will happen with the stories after the meeting?
Please note that the collection of the Most Significant Change Stories is an important
element of this Evaluation. So please do not miss an opportunity to show case the good
work that you have done, as it is told by those who saw the changes happening.
The stories will be sent to the Reference Group who will constitute themselves into a panel
to select at least 6 stories (at least two per theme) that demonstrate the most significant
change resulting from Project. The five will be compiled and documented into a stand-
alone short report, showcasing the significant changes as they are reported by those who
participated or benefitted from the programme. That should be an exciting product if we
conduct this activity very well. The short publication will be annexed to the main report.
Story writing Tips

Most MSC stories are a page or a bit longer, maximum two pages. Shorter MSC stories
are quicker and easier to read, but they should not be too short that vital information is left

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out. It is important to encourage and develop confidence in the participants to write stories.
The format for story writing should be simple and suitable even for beginners, who are not
skilled storywriters, to assist them to ask relevant questions, for writing Significant Change
stories and capturing change in the context of the monitoring or evaluation work that they
are doing.
A significant change story must capture the perspective of the storyteller and explain why
they value the change. In order to fully understand the significance of the change a SC
story must contain three central parts.
a. A description of the situation before the change happened.
b. The process of change and describe what happened, the nature and type of
support provided; factors that facilitated the change and help overcome the barriers.
c. The situation as it exists today, how is the situation different now? And what
difference has this made in their life i.e. the results of change. These details in a
story help the reader to understand the significance of the change
Please find below a few examples of significant Change Stories and the format with which
they take. It is surely a simple process if you are excited about getting down personal
stories in writing!!!!!

Adopted from Kin Partners group of consultants

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