Source: The Guardian
With violence against women resurgent and the US president fuelling misogyny, this man is an inspiration. He deserves his Nobel prize.
Today’s announcement of the Nobel peace prize for Denis Mukwege, with co-winner Nadia Murad, is a deeply deserved recognition for an extraordinary man who has risked everything to heal, cherish and honour women. It is a call to men across the planet to do the same. There are many reasons why the world needs to know the story of my friend Mukwege, who founded the Panzi hospital and co-founded the City of Joy in the Democratic Republic of Congo. But in 2018, we need to hear that story more than ever.
Source: AllAfrica
A Nigerian policeman who served as a UN peacekeeper in the Democratic Republic of Congo has been sent home and barred from peacekeeping after an investigation found he had sexually exploited a woman, a UN spokesman said Tuesday.
The allegations against the Nigerian national date back to February and March 2017, but the woman later withdrew her complaint to the MONUSCO peace mission.
Source: The Star
Rwanda on Friday ordered the release on bail of a vocal critic of President Paul Kagame, further raising hopes for greater political tolerance in the country after the release last month of another jailed opposition figure
A Rwandan High Court judge ruled that Diane Rwigara and her mother, who was arrested along with her mother last year, would be released immediately but that they were not allowed to leave the capital Kigali "without the prosecutor's authorization".
Source: The Guardian
In a country where one in four women have a child by 19, and health workers offering birth control have been met by men with machetes, confronting myths about contraception is vital.
A woman lies on her back, a one-year-old straddling her. One hand is over her eyes, the other held out. A nurse gently inserts a small white strip of contraceptive implant into her upper arm while her baby plays on her. They beckon me in. Privacy hardly seems to be an issue here.
Source: Face2FaceAfrica
In Niger and certain parts of northern Nigeria, a form of slavery and sexual exploitation still runs rampant although it is not widely discussed in larger circles. It was outlawed in 2005, nevertheless, it is still carried out in secret with the assistance of tribal chiefs, traders and families.
Wahaya is practiced by men of wealth as a way to exhibit their riches and flaunt their social status. This includes noblemen, farmers, tradesmen and businessmen further fueling sexual abuse, exploitation, underage ‘marriage’ and sex trafficking.In Islam, a man is permitted to marry up to four wives, as long as he can equally and provide for all of his spouses. In the practice of wahaya, wahayu or sadaka, a man acquires a 5th “wife” via a sale in which this wife becomes a slave to her husband as well as any other spouses and children he may have.
Source: The Southern Times
Women in the Southern Africa Development Community (SADC) countries continue to be denied equal representation in political and decision-making positions at various levels of governance.
A damning document seen by The Southern Times discussed in the SADC Council of Ministers’ meeting held in Namibia last month shows that there has not been a significant improvement in the number of women representation at various levels of governance. In fact, women representation at various levels of governance has decreased in the last five years (2014-2018).
Source: Egyptian Streets
Detained Egyptian human rights activist and actress Amal Fathy has been sentenced for 2 years in prison and received a EGP 10,000 fine on 29 September for “spreading false news” and bad mouthing the state on a social media video.
Source: The Guardian
Despite high levels of violence within relationships in Nigeria, wedding vows are still regarded as sacred, and women are urged to stay with bullying husbands
Dr Perpetua Mbanefo was just getting ready to drive to her new internship in Lagos when her husband suddenly got upset, seizing her car keys and medical licence. “He said I am becoming too free. Then I asked him for my things back and he got very upset, dragged me and threatened to stab me with a broken bottle.”
Source: Voice of America
South Sudanese women leaders are calling on the president to give 35 percent of executive appointments to women, as agreed to in the recently revitalized peace deal.
On Tuesday, President Salva Kiir appointed 10 people to a committee tasked with starting the process to create South Sudan's envisioned transitional government. Only one of the 10 are women.
Source: CNN Africa
A Kenyan governor has been charged with aiding and abetting the murder of a pregnant student with whom, prosecutors say, he was in an "intimate relationship." Gov. Okoth Obado of Migori County in western Kenya is accused of killing Sharon Otieno, 26, who was abducted September 3 alongside local journalist Barack Oduor.
Johannesburg, 27 September 2018: On 28 September, International Day of Safe Abortion, organisations across the Southern African Development Community (SADC) will join hands to demand safe abortion for women as part of a broader “voice and choice” campaign.
Gender Links, SAFAIDS and the Southern Africa Gender Protocol Alliance will launch a campaign for access to services in South Africa and Mozambique (the only two countries in the region where abortion is legal) and decriminalisation of abortion in the 13 other countries in the region.
Source: Albawaba The Loop
Tens of Sudanese went to social media to argue over women rights and equality in the north African country, Sudan.
This came after a video was shared of a heated discussion between Sudanese women and the head of the Sudan Scholars Corporation, Mohammed Osman Saleh, over regulating female dress and reasons behind the rising sexual harassment rates.
Source: BBC News
A new study has found that nearly half of Kenyan mothers with disabled babies were pressured to kill them. The two-year research, carried out by the charity Disability Rights International, also found that such mothers are often blamed for the conditions of their children.
IN A dusty village in southern Niger, Fatia holds her daughter close to her breast, smiling, though the baby looks much too large for her. Four years ago she married at the age of 16, she reckons, but she may have been younger. Since then she has had two children.
Three out of four girls in Niger are married before they are 18, giving this poor west African country the world’s highest rate of child marriage. The World Bank says it is one of only a very small number to have seen no reduction in recent years; the rate has even risen slightly. The country’s minimum legal age of marriage for girls is 15, but some brides are as young as nine.
Source: All Africa
Women from a rural community in the north of the country are demanding better access to customary farmland. In many regions across Africa, land remains under the control of men thanks to stubborn cultural barriers.
In the small rural community of Bagliga in northern Ghana, a crowd of angry women march towards the chief's palace. They're demanding better access to land. It's a rare sight in this part of the country, where land has long been under control of chiefs and men.
Source: AllAfrica
Migori Governor Okoth Obado has been arrested over the murder of his pregnant girlfriend Sharon Otieno.
Mr Obado was on Friday morning grilled by detectives at the headquarters of the Directorate of Criminal Investigations (DCI) on Kiambu Road in Nairobi.He spent the better part of the morning with detectives and sources told the Nation that he was expected to record a statement on the matter.
His arrest comes a day after detectives and government scientists confirmed that the baby boy ripped from Ms Sharon Otieno’s womb was his, thus putting the Migori governor at the heart of investigations into the abduction and killing of the Rongo University student.
Source: AllAfrica
A Public Health Scientist, Suzanne Bell on Thursday said the abortion rate by women of reproductive age in Nigeria has risen between 1.8 and 2.7 million.
Mrs Bell, who made the disclosure at a dissemination exercise of the Performance Monitoring and Accountability 2020 (PMA 2020) in Abuja, said that the rise was as a result of unintended pregnancies.
Source: Thomson Reuters Foundation
For almost two decades, 42-year-old Patience earned a steady income sending girls from Nigeria to Europe for sex work, using black magic to stop the women from fleeing.
Now she is afraid the illegal trade could kill her.
During a ceremony in March, Oba Ewuare II, leader of the historic kingdom of Benin in southern Nigeria, invoked curses on anyone who used witchcraft to aid illegal migration. Since then, anecdotal evidence suggests the trafficking has slowed although it is too soon for firm data to be collated. The number of female Nigerians arriving in Italy by boat surged to more than 11,000 in 2016 from 1,500 in 2014, with at least four in five forced into prostitution, according to data from the International Organization for Migration (IOM).
Source: Daily Monitor
Rwandan opposition politician Victoire Umuhoza Ingabire has vowed to push for the opening up of the political space days after she was released from prison following a presidential pardon.
Ms Ingabire was freed on Saturday September 15 after serving eight of her 15-year sentence.She had been arrested in 2010 soon after returning from exile in the Netherlands seeking to contest for the presidency.She was charged with inciting revolt against the government, forming armed groups to destabilise the country, and minimising the 1994 Genocide against the Tutsi.
Source: Metro
Girls in Kenya are forced to have sex with older men because it is the only way they can access sanitary products due to period poverty and the stigma surrounding menstruation. Research by Unicef has found that 65% of females in the Kibera slum, the largest urban slum in Africa, had traded sex for the sanitary products. The charity also found that 54% of Kenyan girls said they had problems accessing feminine hygiene products and 22% of school girls are having to buy their own.