Violence Against Women
Source: allAfrica The Ministry of Gender and Development is urging the Liberian media to help provide the platform for citizens both in rural and urban communities to see the need for the passage of the draft bill on domestic violence.
Deputy Gender and Development Minister for Technical Services, Madam Annette Kiawu, said there are 2,652 cases of domestic violence since the Convention on the Elimination of all Forms of Violence against Women was signed into law.
Speaking over the weekend during a one-day media awareness working session on the bill at the Ministry, she said rape tops domestic crime list with 900 cases, covering the period of 2009 to 2013.
Madam Kiawu pointed out that categories of domestic violence include fighting, kicking, knocking on another person within the family that could end up hurting the body, sexually, mental imbalance or causing other sufferings and pains to women, men and children.
Physical violence, according to the draft bill, is doing something to someone or putting fear in someone to do something bad; while emotional abuse is a situation where a person calls other person funny names, or stops another person from doing things freely.
"Economic abuse means denying somebody money or other things that are supposed to be for that person under the law for life and protection, or denial of basic resources due to conflict," Madam Kiawu added.
She also pointed to abandonment, persistent non-support, physical assault, harmful traditional practice as the least recorded by the Ministry of Gender and Development. At the end of the session, journalists organized themselves into a network to report on gender-sensitive issues.
One of the recommendations proffered is engagement with lawmakers and their constituents to continually educate or remind them about the essence of the document to enhance the passage of the draft bill.
Madam Kiawu said when enacted into law, the document will create a legal platform to address issues relative to domestic violence and help make the society better for men, women and children.