Source: The Citizen
Tanzania joined other countries around the world to launch the annual campaign to highlight issues around violence against women last Friday. The 16-day campaign is usually a series of annual events to raise public awareness on the vice as well as exhort policymakers to improve their respective countries' status as far as the legal regime is concerned to improve the lives of females.

So in the course of the next two and a half weeks human rights activists across the country will be trying to reach out as many people as possible.
While most people associate violence with men, and they are usually viewed as the aggressors against women, the truth is that men too are increasingly becoming victims in their own right. Traditionally, men were seen as the masculine face of society and thus it was easy for them to misapply that advantage against hapless girls and women.

Women have since made a significant mark in society, or even rivalled men in grounds that were traditionally a preserve or dominated by men.
That is why it is important that this year's focus is on men as agents of positive change as the nation tries to eliminate gender-based violence and discrimination.

The State should also strongly see the need to repeal bad laws such as those about property rights, marriage and boy-girl discrimination to bring about equitability and socioeconomic development.

• Tanzania