UN wants boys sensitised early to GBV war
Damackline Bonareri, 26, who was stabbed to death by her lover in Karagita, Naivasha. United Nations Population Fund wants boys sensitised to the need to fight GBV.
What you need to know:
- Participants at a virtual side event of the Eighth Session of the Africa Regional Forum on Sustainable Development argue that Covid-19 had shown the world how gender inequalities worsened women and girls’ exposure to GBV.
- They said by shifting harmful social norms that foster gender inequality and violence against women and girls, the world would win the fight against GBV.
The United Nations has called for early sensitisation of boys to their role in creating and sustaining a society free from violence against women and girls.
United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) deputy regional director Beatrice Mutali said promoting healthy behaviours among boys would enable them to champion gender equality.
“It is critical to expose boys to gender equitable norms, behaviours and attitudes at young age (so that they know it is wrong to violate a girl or a woman),” she said on Monday during a virtual side event of the Eighth Session of the Africa Regional Forum on Sustainable Development.
The forum, organised by UN Women and UNFPA in East and Southern Africa, discussed the importance of positive masculinity in building a resilient economy in the aftermath of the Covid-19 shocks.
Toxic masculinity
The participants included representatives from the African Union Commission, the Democratic Republic of Congo and civil society groups from Malawi, Rwanda and Uganda. They noted that toxic masculinity threatens the war on violence against women and girls.
They argued that Covid-19 had shown the world how gender inequalities worsened women and girls’ exposure to gender-based violence (GBV).
By shifting harmful social norms that foster gender inequality and violence against women and girls, the world would win the fight against GBV, they said.
“To achieve sustainable development, we must transform the way masculinity maintains unequal structures of power within institutions and across society,” said Adekemi Ndieli, UN Women representative for Uganda.
