Salima senior citizen Mustapha Ulanda who has lived his whole life in Traditional Authority Makanjira's area vividly recalls when his granddaughter gave birth on their way to the hospital, describing the event as daunting till this day.

Women in the area had to travel to Khombedza Health centre which is situated 20 kilometres to access maternal services and most of the times women could deliver on the way before reaching the hospital.

He said when his granddaughter labour progressed and she could not manage to continue the journey, they had no option but to help her deliver the baby in the bush.

"We stopped at a nearby bush I left my wife with our granddaughter and rushed to the nearest house for help, fortunately I found elderly women who rushed to the scene to help my granddaughter, she was assisted and gave birth, but the dehumanising scenes of that day still haunt us," he said.

Another community member, Tabiya Mustapha narrates how she struggled when she was expectant to access maternal services saying she did not attend antenatal clinic.

"I did not attend antenatal clinic for the nine months of the pregnancy, because I needed to have an amount of money not less than MK5000 to hire a bicycle to access maternity services," she says.

Mustapha says as a result of not attending antenatal clinic, she did not know her exact dates of delivering a thing which she describes as dangerous, because when she started having labour signs it was too late to travel to the nearest health facility.

"I ended up giving birth in the village assisted by our elderly ladies, something that is not commendable for the health of the baby and the mother," she narrates.

Mustapha and her fellow women from Senior Chief Makanjira's area and surrounding communities can now sigh with relief after a construction of the MK 170 million health facility in their area under World Bank’s Governance to Enable Service Delivery (GESD) project.

With the construction of the health centre, women will be not be travelling long distance to access health services and they will be assisted on time, therefore reducing the number of child and maternal deaths.

Mustafa says the construction of the maternity hospital in her village is a huge milestone because it will save lives, and dignify the pregnancy journey of women.

Chairperson for the project Management Committee, Apatsa Rajab says the project has also helped many productive individuals from the area to find employment.

He says in their records more than 20 people were employed during the construction process, enhancing livelihoods.

"The constructor was very considerate because he took the community members as his partners, in so doing there was a good working relationship between the constructor and the community members."

He adds: "Through the employment people have managed to construct houses, start-up businesses, therefore the socio economic aspect of this project is tangible."

He further commends the project for enhancing their capacity in project monitoring, and having overall knowledge of how they can be part of projects and work with a constructor so that he delivers quality work.

"We have undergone capacity development trainings through this project, the trainings were helpful, because the knowledge will go a long way in shaking up development in our area," he says.

Senior Chief Makanjira says as a custodian of the people he has a sense of fulfilment because lives will be saved, it was disheartening to be receiving news of maternal deaths year in year out, knowing that lives could be saved if a maternity hospital was nearby.

He narrates how he had been proposing to have the facility, until he started giving up on the day he would witness such a development being implemented in his area.

He also holds the plight of how the construction has been within its timeframe, revealing that the health facility will be functional by September 2022.

Makanjira says the communities were taking part in the construction work and there was transparency and accountability, because people had all the information concerning the construction.

"We have had constructors who never sought the services of local communities, they always brought in people from elsewhere something which is not good to the development of the people of this area," he explains.

District Commissioner for Salima Grace Chirwa Kanyimbiri, echoes how they were unable to implement projects of such magnitude due to inadequate resources, even after knowing how life changing such projects would be to the lives of community members.

GESD has gone a long way in terms of assisting Salima District Council's members of start to acquire knowledge through trainings, and facilitating refresher courses.

"GESD has improved capacity at all levels, from community members, Chiefs and members of staff at the council," she says.

She gives an example of how transparent the process of selecting Senior Chief Makanjira's area as a project site for the maternity hospital.

"In this past year improving health services was our main focus, women were traveling 20 kilometres to seek medical help and maternity services. It was a death trap for the women." She says.

With such a background everyone in the full council understood the need to come up with a project that will reduce maternity and infant mortality rate in Senior Chief Makanjira's area.

"It was a unanimous decision to accept the project, therefore GESD has improved our efficiency, equality and accountability of public resources," she explains.

GESD is a five year project which is being financed by the World Bank to the tune of US$100 Million to strengthen council’s institutional performance, responsiveness to citizens and management of resources for services delivery.

GESD is a government of Malawi project implemented by National Local Government Finance Committee in the country’s 28 district councils