Press Statement on the occasion of the "16 Days of Activism against Gender Violence"

BAOBAB for Women’s Human Rights (BAOBAB) 

On the occasion of the “16 Days of Activism against Gender Violence” 

Lagos, Nigeria, November 25 2011

Press Statement

Distinguished Ladies and Gentlemen of the Press,

BAOBAB for Women’s Human Rights (BAOBAB) happily welcome you to this Media conversation happening on the first day of the “16 Days of Activism against Gender Violence,” “From Peace in the Home to Peace in the World: Let's Challenge Militarism and End Violence Against Women’.”

The 25th November every year marks the beginning of the “16 Days of Activism against Gender Based Violence” which is an international campaign that started in 1991 dedicated to advocate against all forms of Gender Based Violence. The 16 Days runs from November 25, (International Day against Violence against Women) to December 10, (International Human Rights Day) to symbolically link violence against women and human rights and to emphasise that such violence is a violation of human rights. This 16-day period also highlights other significant dates including December 1, which is World AIDS Day, and December 6, which marks the Anniversary of the Montreal Massacre in 1989, when 14 women students were massacred by a lone gun-man opposed to the affirmative action policies promoted by feminists at the University of Montreal.

Since the “16 days…” campaign started, this period has been utilized by various women’s groups to call for the elimination of violence against women by raising awareness about gender based violence as a human rights issue at the local, national, regional and international levels; strengthening local work around violence against women; establishing a clear link between local and international work to end violence against women; providing a forum in which organisers can develop and share effective strategies; demonstrating the solidarity of women around the world organising against violence against women and creating tools to ask governments to implement promises made to eliminate violence against women.

Over the years, gender based violence has been a cause for concern in Nigeria and the world at large. This is mainly due to the very patriarchal nature of the society and obnoxious cultural beliefs that subjugate women and lead to their systemic discrimination in private and public spheres. The need for strategic campaigns and interventions has become even more crucial with recent reports of the prevalence of rape and assault cases on women and young girls in the country. This rise in the number of cases is a very worrisome development as BAOBAB has also continued to receive more reports of violence against women at its offices and via email and telephone calls. Two of such cases of violence are the alleged infamous gang rape in August 2011 of a young woman by 5 men suspected to be students of Abia State University, as well as the rape of female students of St Anne’s college Ibadan, Oyo state. There was also the cold murder of a female banker allegedly by her husband, amongst others.

The theme for this year’s campaign is ‘From Peace in the Home to Peace in the World: Let's Challenge Militarism and End Violence against Women’. BAOBAB for Women’s Human Rights is today joining other partners around the world to mark the period with a series of activities which include: a Gender and leadership training for young boys and girls between the ages of 13 -17 years; solidarity street campaign by a network of Men and Boys against Violence against Women (MABVAW); an in-house debate by the BAOBAB team on “Violence Against Women and Globalization, ”as well as various social advocacy activities by members of our community based volunteer outreach teams in 15 states of the country.

BAOBAB is using this opportunity to call on the government of Nigeria to:

1. Expedite the passage of the Gender and Equal Opportunities Bill into Law;

2. Expedite the reintroduction, adoption and passage of the Violence Against Persons Prohibition Bill into Law;

3. Establish support mechanisms including one-stop centers for victims of SGBV and formal shelters in collaboration with women focused NGOs;

4. Strengthen existing laws and frameworks to protect women from FGM and other harmful practices

5. Increase involvement of women in peace building processes and strengthen CSO collaboration for sustained engagement in conflict prevention and peace building.

6. Improve the collection of disaggregated data and maintenance of statistics on SGBV.

7. Ensure efficient investigation and prosecution of SGBV cases.

Distinguished friends of the Press and fellow agents of social transformation, once again we are happy that you have honoured this invitation to participate in the conversations of the next few hours and some of the activities with us, and we hope that this will translate to further collaboration towards eliminating all forms of gender based violence and consequently promote human development. Remember, if it is not good for your mother, daughter or sister, then it is not good for any woman! Let’s stop violence against Women now!

Thank You all

Chibogu Obinwa

Ag. Executive Director

See more posting on Baobab's blog

DO something, SAY something - Original Article by Fungai Rufaro Machirori

Note: This is a recirculation of this post by a Zimbabwean Blogger Fungai- Visit her blog

This shouldn’t be happening in 2010.

In fact, it shouldn’t be happening ever.

When I saw the images of this woman’s plight, I felt my heart plummet into my bowels. I felt the anger seeping into my blood. I asked myself if it was possible that a man could be so heartless as to inflict such pain onto another human being, especially since in my last post, I so fervently celebrated the joys of having men in the world.

Over the weekend, I received an email from the Zimbabwe Gender Forum about a young woman who was recently attacked by her husband. In the physical battle that ensued, he plucked out her hair and caused so much damage to her abdomen that she needed an operation to reorder her intestines which had premusbaly unravelled and torn due to the impact. The same woman was hospitalised at one of Harare’s hospitals while her husband was remanded in custody. And the story only gets worse. The hospital where she received treatment detained her for failure to pay her medical bills. Only through the efforts of Musasa Project (an organisation working to end gender-based violence) did she finally receive assistance.
What kind of a health system is that anyway? What has the world come to when those who have already suffered oppression at the hands of an individual must also suffer oppression at the hands of a system?!!
What would have happened to this woman – also the mother of two children below the age of 5 – if no one had been there to help her? Does anyone care?! I am very worried by this situation on many levels because it just reflects the ugliness of our society. Zimbabwe has had a Domestic Violence Act in place for over 3 years now but implementation thereof is still a massive challenge due to lack of financial and political commitment. Men still get off scott-free if they know the right buttons to press within the system. A bribe here and there and a whole docket of information can disappear from the police records.


What social protection do we as women therefore have? In June, I was at Harare’s ONLY adult rape clinic and learnt with shock, anguish and fear that the centre is facing severe funding shortfalls and due to to this cannot expand its services to become a 24-hour service to provide full attention to rape survivors. For now, the clinic only operates on week days from 8am-4pm. This means that if you are raped on a Friday evening, you can only get assistance from the clinic the following Monday morning. And because the nature of a rape investigation entails the survivor keeping evidence of the incident on their body, one must not wash off the traces of semen and sperm from their body until they can be examined.

A woman at the clinic had to endure that plight – just take a moment to imagine how horrendous that would feel. The shame, the reminder of it all, the smell, the feeling of filth covered all over you.By the time she could be attended to on the Monday morning, the staff at the clinic described her as “stinking”. What protection do we as women have from our men, from a patriarchal society that keeps telling us it’s all our fault for not being good enough women, that we deserve a bashing every now and then to keep us one th straight and narrow?


Men, you are both the problem and the solution. Value us as human beings. Respect our bodies as the vessles that house our souls, our creativity, our womanhood.
Do not invade us.
Do not kill us.
We are your sisters. And you are our brothers.
I began this post with a story that shouldn’t be told in 2010. The pictures of this tragedy shouldn’t exist. I shouldn’t even be writing this all.
But I am. Are you going to do anything about it? Or are you just going to close your eyes and walk away from it all?
Do something! Say something!
Help spread the word that this is not acceptable.

LET'S PRAY ALL FORMS OF VIOLENCE BACK TO HELL!

In the spirit of 16 DAYS OF ACTIVISM AGAINST VIOLENCE AGAINST WOMEN (25/11/2009 - 10/12/2009), I present to you the documentary on the effort of Liberia women in bringing the war of over a decade to an end. This is to allow us see that women have a role to play in the development of their nation.

The documentary "PRAY BACK THE DEVIL TO HELL" brought together women from Christain background, women from Islamic background and they were all united for a common Goal - PEACE in Liberia!

Most often women are excluded from peace table but they are often the one to bear the brunt of war, the sexual violence, sexual exploitation, the killing of their children, husband, friends and family, the caretaking of children and others during the war, the displacement from their home and countries...

To have women inclusion in decision making on security issues as well as dealing with issues of all forms of violence against women during war including low intensity conflict situations, we need to implement the UN Security Council Resolution 1325 in all countries in the world.

Take a decision to day, in the spirit of 16 Days of Activism to:

1. pray all forms of violence against women back to hell
2. pray inequality back to hell
3. pray assault, rape, sexual violence against women back to hell
4. pray all form of violence and exploitation on one another and our nations back to hell
5. pray bad leadership back to hell
6. pray the use of children as child soldiers back to hell
7. pray HIV back to hell
8. pray low intensity conflict, armed conflict, violent conflict back to hell
9. Pray climate change back to hell!

Let our prayers, be our actions, let our prayers be our decision, let our prayers be the change we want to see, let our prayer be our invlovement in bringing those change alive.

Note that the documentary has being compressed to fit the youtube speculated time.

No Word for RAPE....

I have ready countless articles on rape cases in Nigeria. Most times the victims are either under 18 or over 50. Many young girls of under 10 have being gang-raped and killed.

I have heard this argument in different quaters that "when women/ladies/girls will not stop exposing thier bodies,why would they not get raped?" "In fact they brought this upon themselves"

There is a right for people to dress in the way they are comfortable with and this is in no way a basis for rape! By the way, how has a 10 year old or a 90 year old female dress to bring this act upon themselves? How does anyone deserve to be raped?

There are marital rape too and this is in no way, excusable. When there is no consent by a partner to have intercourse and if he or she is forced, that is RAPE!

There is no word for rape than SENTENCE! There is no forgiveness for a RAPIST than to face the music. To have a better society, let us all say no to violence of any form against other human being. Our world will be a better place if we all do what is right and if we all respect the rights of others

THERE IS NO WORD FOR RAPE ONLY PROSECUTION AND SENTENCE!

16 days of Activism Against Gender based Violence: Where do you stand?

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on your blog for daily Take Back the Tech actions!

WE ARE NOT HAPPY

A lot of women's human rights organisations, media houses, bloggers, facebookers etc are interested in Uzoma Okere's story. She was battered by some naval officers for not leaving the road for them to pass while in traffic. See story here and here .Visit here for update as well. Waffarian has got the picture of the Zombie Naval Admiral.
Below is a protest letter to be published by as many newspaper outlets as possible and any other means like blog, facebook is welcome.... Please join this crusade anyway you can.

WE ARE NOT HAPPY

(Young Women In Nigeria protest against Naval beating of Uzoma Okere)

We learnt recently about a case where six armed naval ratings attached to a Rear Admiral went berserk in Lagos, beating up and stripping a lady identified as Uzoma Okere. This is totally unacceptable and as citizens of this country, we believe that we have a responsibility to call on other Nigerians especially the governement, law practitioners and other relevant authorities to bring these men to justice. In a country where we are committed to protecting the human rights of individuals, we cannot fold our arms and do nothing. We were not there at the scene of the incidence to stop such distaseteful act but we can still do something and even if we cannot do anything, we will speak against it. This is totally wrong.

This young lady could be any one of us, our mother, our sister, cousin, aunty or someone close to us. She id the victim today. Tommorrow we do not know who it will be. Should we continue to live in fear? Is our country not safe enough? Can we not find refuge in our justice system? I don't think any of these is true.

We as young Nigerian women are not happy with what has happened and we are saying something about it now. We are also calling on our mothers, fathers, uncles, aunties, brothers, sisters and others who have the authority and resources to punish these culprits to do so. This is the time for change in the world and we have to contribute in our own little way to creating that positive change and making the world a better and safer place for us, our mothers and daughters.

..............................................................................................................................................................

Greeting from FEMINIST TECHNOLOGY EXCHANGE IN CAPE TOWN. We are now in Monkey Valley and I have met 2 wonderful cats. Will blog about them tomorrow.

The Unlawful privileges

It amazes me how the law enforcers in our society tend to break the law they are to enforce so easily. This is common in Lagos where I reside and I always ponder and feel weak to see what is going on . I am not talking about the court system but those that suppose to work and in hand with the court, to either curb corruption or bring offender to book. The job of enforcing the law and punishing the offenders is an Herculean task that suppose to be done with seriousness and dignity. You have to be disciplined and focused to succeed.

Let's look at the police force, Not that the Nigeria police force and the other officers in uniform are not aware of why they are here and of what they need to do. They just choose to do the opposite.

Commercial vehicles drivers/conductors always capitalise on having one police officer in their bus to be able to commit all the offences against the traffic rules. They look for a police officer or another officer in uniform (by saying another officer in uniform, I am reffering to road safety officers, LASMA, VIO's, army etc), make their conductor hang by the bus door; risking his life, have incomplete papers, overtake unnecessarily. All because our officers in uniform would not pay a dime, they always ride for free. But I really wonder if this riding for free translates to “you are free to break the law”. Officers in uniform always encourage this act. I call this an unlawful privilege.

Worst still, if you know of any officer, if you like go and fight out there. You will be acquainted and the poor victim will be further victimised because he/she knows an officer!!! The officers themselves try to victimize innocent citizens because they have got guns!!! If they ask you stupid questions and you challenged them, they go into a wide and endless rage and would easily threaten an arrest and all that. Why? Whatever happened to freedom of speech? I doubt if they mention that to them in their training.

A lady was said to be beaten up by two hefty men in mufti for putting on a camouflage cap. They told them she disrespected the army and did not give her a change to say sorry. She ended up in a hospital. I wonder why this had to end the way it did. 

 

If you are in Nigeria and you are a "Lagosian" (or you live in other part of Nigeria) and you go out on daily basis, you must have witnessed or contributed to this in one way or the other. Do you care to share your thought or experience for further discussion?

By the way, do not forget to visit Blue Eyed Blonde Blog. Let’s welcome our systa to blogville. She writes well and has got a lot to share.

When will the violence stop?

She was pregnant and the beating went on. She was always weak and tired but she could not tell anyone what her loving husband does to her. He beat her up at every chance he got. Even the fact that she was carrying their second child did not alter the pattern. One day, after the delivery of their baby, she was beating again!!! Something turned her head that day for she picked up a coca-cola bottle using all her strength; she broke it on her husband’s head!
This is the story of WOMAN “A”

 

She assumed the role of the breadwinner of the family. For better for worse they say. Hubby lost his job but that didn’t deter her from doing all in her power to put food on the table for her family. By 4:30am she is up to care for the children before leaving for work at 6:00 am everyday. She would come home in the evening to prepare their dinner. The fact that her husband was in the house all day did not alter her role of cooking the dinner no matter how late she got back from work. On top of all her effort not to make her family suffer, she was constantly beating up by the love of her life. She was beating today as usual, her siblings had to phone one another to come and rescue their beloved sister in the hands of the monster called her husband. The only means they know of rescuing her is to give her husband his own taste of medicine. They beat him till he shit!
That went the story of WOMAN “B”.

Discharged from the hospital, from an accident that nearly claimed her life. She lost members of her family in this accident. They were all in the same bus that was gutted by fire. She was the only surviving person. She left the hospital in a fairly good shape at last but still she was traumatized. She would still need to see a psychologist though she wasn’t sure how she would find or pay for one. She left for her home to begin the recovery process but her husband saw to it that she got NO rest. She was beating up the first day she got home! He ignored the neck brace on her by dishing out hot slaps on her already damaged and broken body. Alas, the neighbours could not watch this maltreatment any more. They took law into their hands and beat her sweet love till he fainted! 
That was how WOMAN “C” was treated.

“I have come to report my husband sir, he wants to kill me, see the bruises on my body from the beating” she cried to the police officer she met at the police station near her house. The police officer looked at her for a moment with no compassion reflected on his face and barked at her; “What did you do? A beg, e be your husband and this is a domestic matter, go back and resolve it between you 2”. She was dumbstruck. “So, the law cannot protect me?” She thought to herself as she turned her back on the police station. She did not live long after that. She died in the hands of her husband when she was receiving her last beating. 
WOMAN D got no protection.

On the street, she was stopped, before she could say "Obama", she saw the rains of slaps baptizing her already disfigured face. She recognised her violator, her husband!!! The same beast she is being running from for Months now. “Where are my children? You left my house with my 5 children, I will kill you today”. He said to his wife as he dragged her across the street. “What did you do?” “How can you abandon your husband?” Asewo/ ashawo/ prostitute go back to your husband” “Don‘t let her escape again o, useless woman”. These are all the comforting words she got from the street sellers and passers-by.
What is now the fate of WOMAN E?

When will these violence stop/end? When will it be told to the perpetrators and their accomplices that “THERE IS NO JUSTIFICATION FOR ANY VIOLENCE COMMITTED AGAINST WOMEN?