Follow Us on Google
By Daniel Kanu
The 16 Days of activism against Gender-Based Violence, an annual international campaign that kicked off on November 25, the International Day for the Elimination of Violence against Women, ended yesterday, the International Human Rights Day.
Led by civil society, the campaign is supported by the United Nations through the Secretary General’s UNiTE by 2030 to End Violence against Women initiative.
This year, the UN marked the 16 Days under the theme “UNiTE! Activism to end violence against women and girls”.
In UN findings, more than one in three women experience gender-based violence during their lifetime.
More than five women or girls are killed every hour by someone in their own family.
Less than 40 per cent of women who experience violence seek help of any sort.
Violence against women and girls going by research remains the most pervasive human rights violation around the world.
Already heightened by the COVID-19 pandemic, its prevalence is now being further increased by the intersecting crises of climate change, global conflict, and economic instability.
Against this setting, a backlash against women’s rights is predicted to be underway around the world.
Anti-feminist movements are said to be on the rise, attacks against women human rights defenders and activists are up, and the legal status of women’s rights is increasingly imperiled in many countries.
Most stakeholders say that “Regressive new laws are exacerbating impunity for perpetrators of domestic violence, governments are using force against femicide and gender-based violence protestors, and women’s rights organizations are being increasingly marginalized”.
In Nigeria, the sensitisation of women was massive as different socially-relevant gender-based organisations organised different enlightenment programmes to that effect.
For instance, Lagos State government through its Domestic and Sexual Violence Agency participated in the 16 Days of Activism exercise to rid the state of the menace of Sexual and Gender-Based Violence (SGBV).
The Executive Secretary, of Lagos State Domestic and Sexual Violence Agency (DSVA), Mrs. Titilola Vivour-Adeniyi, kicked off the Lagos campaign in Ikeja.
She said that there was the need to tackle SGBV which individuals and communities faced, with a resultant impact, which in most cases was devastating to the victims.
Viviour-Adeniyi told Sunday Sun that the campaign would x-ray 16 pivotal ways to ameliorate and address the grappling issues of SGBV that individuals and communities are faced with, a resultant impact which in most cases is devastating to the good.
She said that each of the 16 Days of Activism would be saddled with a new hope, to be given by Lagos governor, Babajide Sanwo-Olu.
According to her, some of the activities earmarked for the campaign included Advocacy Walk in Epe; and Engagement of 3,000 Children on Preventing Child Abuse.
Other activities included door to door community engagements, market fiestas, and engagement of the youth.
In Bauchi State, the Emir of Bauchi, Dr Rilwanu Suleiman Adamu was reported to have strongly condemned various cases of gender-based violence in the state despite the fact that the Violence Against Persons Prohibition (VAPP) law has been domesticated in the state.
The monarch made the condemnation in his palace when he received a coalition of 16 Civil Society Organizations (CSOs) that paid him an advocacy visit as part of activities to commemorate the 2022, 16 Days of Activism Against Gender-Based Violence in Bauchi.
Activist, Aisha Kilishi, the State Amira, Federation of Muslim Women Association of Nigeria (FOMWAN), who led the coalition to the Emir palace also condemned the increasing rate of gender violence against women.
Kilishi harped on the urgent need for the empowerment of women in the state, saying that the high rate of divorce in society has made many women vulnerable to rape and other violence.
The Centre for Awareness on Justice and Accountability (CAJA), a not-for-profit organisation based in Kano, Northwest Nigeria, was not left out.
Recently, the group partnered with social media influencers in Northern Nigeria to amplify the war on sexual violence, and to promote survivors’ courage to speak up.
During the partnership inauguration, the executive director of the group, Comrade Kabiru Dakata, said that the partnership is intended to combat the cancerous problem of sexual harassment mostly in academia by promoting awareness using social media.
Maryam Ahmad, a lawyer with CAJA, said there is need to harmonise legal framework policies in various institutions.
While highlighting key issues with the Anti-Sexual Harassment Bill, she demanded that President Buhari should sign the bill into law without further delay.
“The bill intended to harmonise all policies in various tertiary institutions and to fill their gaps in order to have a uniform law that can punish all perpetrators of sexual harassment in a court of law,” she told Sunday Sun.
According to Ahmad, the pervasive problem of sexual harassment in the academia necessitates an urgent and significant legal approach that can solve the problem once and for all.
From the East, West, North, and South, the story is the same on gender-based violence against women.
Thirty years after the first world conference on women in Mexico, women are still sensitising the world on why violence and inhumane laws against their gender are unacceptable.
While many argue that these laws protect women, there has been a high rate of domestic violence, sexual and physical abuse against women, according to reports.
Also in a recent report given by the UN, approximately 736 million women (equal to almost one in three) have been subjected to physical and/or sexual intimate partner violence, non-partner sexual violence, or both at least once in their life.
The above statistics show that the laws, perhaps, have not done much to reduce the violence against women.
Another report released by UNESCO, reveals that 52 million girls are not in school in Africa, while 4 million will never step into a classroom compared to 2 million boys. The report shows that education in Africa is only accessible to a few women.
However, the few women with access to education seem not exempted from dealing with patriarchal traditions and cultures that trample on their rights.
Felix Agbonrofo, Principal Counsel, Starpearl Solicitors, Lagos State said there are enough laws, particularly, in Lagos to tackle any form of violence against women.
He said it is left to women to explore such legal provisions.
Agboronfo told Sunday Sun “As far as this gender-based violence is concerned we have laws Sufficient enough to protect the women, particularly in Lagos state there is an agency of government set up to tackle domestic violence and they have been very effective.
“What is important is for women to voice out the exact challenge that they have and go to the appropriate place to seek justice.
“They should not hesitate to approach the agency in Lagos. Their issues are always taken up very expeditiously. They even go to the level of prosecuting offenders.
“So for Lagos State, I can boldly say that they are on top of the situation. It now behooves on the women to take the necessary step to activate the legal process and it is free. Lagos is In fact pro-women.
“The complaint that should even come is from the men because when you go to the agencies the men are usually presumed to be guilty. The women should not even be the ones complaining now, it should be the men complaining, that they should be given an even hand, they should hear them out, instead of just taking the woman’s word for it.
“Women are sufficiently protected in Lagos, although there can always be an improvement but what we have now can pass as being adequate”.
Jessica Thomas, a legal practitioner told Sunday Sun that women need to be educated to be given platforms to be in power and make decisions on women-sensitive issues.
She submitted: “The number of women in political positions compared to men is alarmingly disproportionate. More women in power will lead to the abolishment of practices that do not promote gender equality”.
Thomas noted that “Aside from violence in all ramifications against the women folk, we still have bad laws militating against women. Examples of such laws are the inheritance laws against women in Eastern Nigeria, money wives stories in South Eastern Nigeria, and much more. There is a need to tackle these issues through sensitisation, abolishment of harmful practices and enactment of good laws”.
For Wale Ogunade, human rights activist and lawyer the issue is not about law but “about human relationship, it’s about moral upbringing , its about training and respect for others privacy and respect for the right of dignity of the other party”.
He told Sunday Sun that there are good laws but that the issue is beyond legality to adequately tackle the monster.
Ogunade said that although gender-based violence issues are mostly seen from the women’s prism, men are equally victims.
Said Ogunade “Generally or unfortunately issues of gender-based violence are always targeted against the girl-child or the woman but we must establish also that the men are victims of gender-based violence in the home and even anywhere, in the offices, etc.
“There are situations where the man too is subject of being violated, being oppressed or being taken advantage of because he is a man and in a state of weakness.
“ We have enough law as far as the issue of domestic violence is concerned but no law can curb it, States like Lagos and Ogun states as I know have enough gender-based laws, courts, and tribunals to ensure they monitor gender-based violence but its still on the increase not for anything but because of relationship, because of home training by spouse by the men and the women, particularly the boys.
“The boys are not trained to be good husbands, it is only the women that are trained to be good wives. And you will find out that most of the time the boys are busy bullying, intimidating, and harassing their wives because nobody trained them to be a good husband.
“Secondly, the economy again is not making things easy, some women cannot cope. Some women came from very good backgrounds and they got married to young men and things are no longer working as they planned, this may lead to misunderstanding and to violence, and sometimes death. It has happened severally.
“To some, inability to absorb shock in the vicissitude of life, in the situation of things changing to bad, and they don’t know how to balance things. This makes some people irritating.
“There are situations where the woman will also want to intimidate the man etc. so these are part of the problem. There are situations that simple understanding or tolerance is needed. Yes, men, most times rape the women but women also do, and in some occasions the women simply seduce the men with the attire they put on, and cry rape, knowing full well that not all men have control discipline”.
