Ngwazi Zazikazi (female champion/hero), a music video produced by UNESCO as part of the European Union (EU) funded STEP (Skills and Technical Education Programme) project in Malawi, has won the European Union Development Cooperation (DEVCO) EUROPEAID Communication Award. This prize is given to the best communication activity of an EU-funded project.

As part of the International Women’s Day celebrations in 2017, STEP launched the song in Malawi. Composed by Robert Chiwamba, a well-known poet and by Sangie, an award-winning musical artist, Ngwazi Zazikazi ranked number one for eight weeks in March and April of 2017 and ended up the number five song of the year in Malawi in 2017.

The awarded music video breaks negative gender norms and beliefs by portraying women in traditionally male-dominated technical trades such as auto mechanics and bricklaying, thereby encouraging more young women to enter technical training courses.

Written in Chichewa, one of Malawi’s languages, the song has been downloaded over 75,000 times and the video viewed over 11,000 times. The EU, the government of Malawi and UNESCO are proud to celebrate this video during the International Women’s Day of 2018(link is external).

Aimed at strengthening the technical, entrepreneurial and vocational education training (TVET) system in Malawi, one of the components of STEP is to promote equitable and gender balance-access to TVET.