Resilience Can Put An End To Gender Base Violence _ APIN
By Prosper Okoye –
Resilience against the forces that inhibits justice for the victims of Gender Base Violence has been Identified as the instrument to “put an end to Gender Base Violence in Benue state.”
Benue State Aids Prevention in Nigeria (APIN) Gender Focal Person, Beatrice Ngozi, said during the quarterly community of practice learning session, held recently at Gboko, that “collaborating organizations’ progress level to tackling GBV cases, has not been optimal, due to local institutional hindrances.”
Albeit the training session, she said, “would equip the participating organizations with the requisite skills that would make them resilient to these institutional hindrances.”
Speaking about the challenges encountered when curbing Gender Base Violence cases, Ukon David, from the Gboko Diocesan Health Initiative said the major obstacle was from victims’ families, especially the mothers.
He further shared a case of sexual violence handled, of a 52 years old man, who violated an 11years old girl:
“The incident happened at Gboko North area; after we had begun following up the case, the mother of the girl refused to fill the GBV screening forms, which would have helped us to get justice for her daughter.
“We cannot continue with the case, because, She says the ‘man is my boyfriend,’ and we are trying to destroy her relationship.”
Elizabeth Ashe from the Caritas Orphan and Vulnerable Children organization, stated that a total of 123 cases of gender base violence, had been identified by her organization, in the quarter been reviewed. And the most dominant cases were that of physical violence.
She revealed that most women were not cooperating with the organizations to expose the perpetrators of these violence acts, because: “we have a culture of Silence. The Women are afraid of what would happen when we are gone, if they should speak up.
“They are afraid that their daughter would forever live with the stigma of rape, if everyone in the community know about it.”
Also, participants alleged that the police and the local chiefs take bribe to avert justice.
Responding, Gender Focal Person, Ushongo Police division, Patricia Igoche stated that the police are not collecting bribes, rather, “it has been the wishes of parties involved to settle out of court.”
Participant were trained on various thematic areas, amongst these were:
“Screening of IPV/Index testing.” By David Backstop.
APIN staff, John Echoga, lectured on: “Gender priority in OVC intervention across Enrollment stream/service domain.”
Barr. Victor Eboh, of Lawyers alert, sensitized the participants on KP gender response.
An Highlight of the event was the good will messages by participants, to commemorate the 2022 International Women’s Day.
