Beyond the Luster

Bringing the Mobile One Stop Centre to Hurungwe’s Dark Corners

By UNDP Zimbabwe Anesu Freddy

October 13^th, 2025

Missed the first 2025 outreach in Nyanga District? Read the journal entries:

stories.undp.org.zw/reaching-the-unreached

Day 0 - Moving Mountains

The excitement is real. We are taking the Mobile One Stop Centre (MOSC) programme to Hurungwe District, Mashonaland West. We’re working with national and local partners towards one critical goal: delivering essential services to high-need rural communities.

Over the next five days, we’re heading to Kajekache, Dete, Bakwa, Pote, and Tengwe. These are areas characterised by farming and mining, but also by religious conservatism and resutltantly, a high rate of Sexual and Gender-Based Violence (GBV).

The MOSC is bringing a full package of support. Communities will be able to access medical care and psychosocial support, report GBV cases, get crucial civil documentation, register for economic empowerment support (including AfCFTA-linked opportunities), and follow up on stalled legal cases.

It’s a huge task ahead, but we’re confident this joint effort will make a real, positive difference. A mountain is moved by carrying away small stones. Tomorrow, we start in Kajekache!

Day One - Kajekache: Unpacking Realities

Our first day in Kajekache immediately revealed how dramatically the face of Gender-Based Violence (GBV) shifts by geography, differing entirely from the cases we encountered in Nyanga earlier this year.

Here in Hurungwe, we observed a deep-seated, and often enforced, resistance to formal justice processes. Reporting for issues like sexual violence and child marriages is worryingly low because survivors are frequently pressured—and sometimes threatened—into accepting informal, community-based settlements.

This context made the involvement of our partners, specifically the National Prosecuting Authority and the Legal Aid Directorate, absolutely essential. They were able to open dialogue with traditional leaders who seem to have limited knowledge regarding current GBV legislation. It's clear that legislation awareness is a crucial next step.

Despite the difficulties getting our full setup here, our collective satisfaction comes from bridging a massive gap. We brought a lifeline of services—justice, health, and empowerment—to a community where the nearest police station or clinic is over 30km away and transport infrastructure is severely limited. That accessibility is the real essence behind Mobile One Stop Centres.

Day Two - Dete: Power of Layered Interventions

Today in Dete was a fantastic illustration of the power of layered development interventions. As UNDP, we aim for support that covers multiple aspects of a community's life, and Dete showed us how those investments truly come together.

We faced a tough journey to this remote and hard-to-reach location. Even before we had reached the halfway mark of our journey, we had already lost access to the mobile network. The national electricity grid had since disappeared by then. Yet, the Dete centre was brilliantly lit and fully operational thanks to the 120kW solar mini-grid we installed last year. At night, this provided crucial lighting for people, ensuring safety, security, and movement.

Crucially, this power availability allowed a satellite internet connection to be set up. It all converged when we had to deal with an emergency: a suspected rabies case. The stable communication link enabled our team to immediately contact the provincial office, which rapidly dispatched both medication and a specialised health team for contact tracing and immediate treatment.

We are primarily here with the MOSC to address Gender-Based Violence (GBV), but we are incredibly pleased that the infrastructure previously put in place allowed us to address this sudden, life-threatening public health emergency, too. The ability to integrate access to justice with health and sustainable energy solutions shows the real strength of our partnership model.

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