Kwanele handbook is the major project I’m working on. I worked with Kwanele’s legal team to draft a guidebook for volunteers and social workers who respond to the helpline (live chat and hotline).
The major topics covered in the handbook includes:
· Definition of GBV
· Different types of GBV
· What causes gender-based violence?
· How to get a protection order?
· Reporting System
· How to lay a charge? (legal support)
· What happens if things are violent at home but victims don’t want to open a case?
· What should victims do if they are at risk of HIV infection?
· How to get medical examinations after being abused?
· How to collect admissible evidence and keep it safe?
· What should I do if someone is on the chatline and actively suicidal?
· What can I do if someone needs emergency extraction? How to find a shelter?
· Post-traumatic recovery: How can survivors reintegrate into their families and communities?
· Avoid secondary victimization: what you should say/what you shouldn’t say
· Avoid unconscious biases
The main goal of this handbook is to summarize the laws related to gender-based violence and domestic violence, make it easy to understand and memorize for our volunteers using different scenarios and examples. The handbook also includes some core values and principles like avoiding secondary victimization and unconscious bias. It’s really important that someone coming to the hotline never feels judged. For example, never assume you know the sex of the individual you are talking to unless they explicitly state it. Same with perpetrator gender. Also if the visitor does tell you their sex, you cannot assume that the perpetrator was of the opposite sex etc.
