By Eunice Chipangula
Malawi is intending to reform its law on the termination of pregnancy by broadening the medical indications which will allow legal termination of pregnancy. This is in line with international instruments which Malawi subscribes to and the national Reproductive Health policy presently being implemented through the Reproductive Health Programme.
The international instruments among other things emphasize sexual and reproductive health rights of women and the right of women to control fertility as fundamental to their empowerment while the Reproductive Health Programme among other things seeks to improve safe maternal health care, to achieve quality family planning, to promote adolescent reproductive health services and the prevention and management of unsafe abortions.
“The proposal for law reform does not advocate the legalization of abortion but only calls for the enlargement of the medical indications to recognize circumstances in which continuing a pregnancy may affect a woman’s health. This shall include mental or physical health as well as in circumstances where a woman has been raped or is a victim of incest, among other issues,” the Commission clarified.
It said that the law shall be consistent with the recommendations made by the Programme of Action adopted at one of the gender conferences in 1994 that stated that ‘in no case should abortion be promoted as a method of family planning.’
The Commission disclosed that currently, there is evidence that women including adolescents in Malawi undergo backstreet abortions which account for 60 per cent of all gynaecological admissions in the country.
It observed that unsafe abortion impacts on women’s reproductive health rights and the recommendation would be one way of domesticating relevant instruments that promote women’s sexual and reproductive health rights.
“This will conform to the recommendation of Convention on the Elimination of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW) that there should not be contradiction between existing laws and the constitution and will help Malawi achieve sustainable development by having a healthy nation,” the Commission observed.
Malawi’s 1995 Republican Constitution provides for adequate health care for all which means that for women, they should be provided with health care that responds to their health needs while the penal code permits abortion only to the extent that it is necessary for the preservation of a pregnant woman’s life. Abortion that is administered or procured on any other ground is a felony. But Malawi’s Reproductive Health Policy of 1992 is limited to the provision for the management and prevention of unsafe abortion. In a related development, the Commission has recommended the introduction of parternity leave in the Employment Act which shall apply only when the spouse is on maternity leave. “The proposal shall govern such leave for men in formal employment”, the Commission said.
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