Translator: Dina Ismail Reviewer: Peter van de Ven
I come from a family of six children,
and I am the fifth.
Six children, I said, and not six girls that we really are.
And that’s because growing up in my family,
gender was never an issue.
My father used to tell us all
that you can be anything you want to be in life
for as long as you set your mind at it
and you walk towards it.
And that was it for me until I turned 13,
when I started becoming socially aware of the gendered nature of society,
and the violence and the discrimination
that women and young girls face.
It all started with papa Delly.
Papa Delly was my neighbor;
he was an Igbo man, so was his wife.
But I think papa Delly’s mum was Yoruba,
because all five children they had,
four girls and a boy,
all had Igbo and Yoruba names.
And interestingly,
both papa Delly and mamma Delly
were called by the name of the only boy and their last child, Delly.
And not the first child, as it is usually the case.
Now, Pappa Delly was involved in an accident
and was hospitalized for about three weeks before he died.
As soon as papa Delly died,
hell was let loose in his family.
His family accused the wife
of masterminding the accident that led to his death.
They actually said that she was a bad wife all along
and accused her of plotting to kill the only boy
in order to wipe out the name of their brother.
So, as soon as the funeral was over,
they forcibly took this little boy
and sent [him] and the four girls out.
Then, my auntie, my dad’s sister, beautiful woman, my dad loved her so much.
You know men and sisters,
and daughters.
And then she actually got married from a compound.
But barely six months into the marriage,
she kept running back home.
I remember vividly the final one,
that made me see so much anger on my father’s face,
I have never seen it before.
When she came back with torn clothes,
bloodshot eyes,
her nose bleeding,
and some scratches on her body.
Yet another fight.
Of course all the times she ran back, when my parents gave her shelter,
they sent for the man, and he would come with a bible,
and he would say it is the devil.
But on that last one,
my parents said no.
And then I went on to the university, and I had a roommate,
who had a boy friend, also an undergraduate,
always excited to go out on a date with this guy,
but most times coming back very sad and teary.
And then, years later when I started work,
there was this case of a man, a Nigerian man married to a Filipino woman
who had three girls,
and he was actually sexually abusing the eldest girl,
who was 12 at the time.
This girl tried running a couple of times.
Unfortunately for her, he would catch her,
and he would tell her, if you succeed in getting away,
then know that you are responsible for me moving down to your junior sister,
who was seven at that time.
Violence against women and young girls
is one of the most pervasive and endemic forms of human rights violation
the world over.
It can be physical in nature,
sexual, and psychological.
And this includes harmful traditional practices.
Male job preference,
female genital mutilation,
widowhood rights.
Around the world, one in three women,
representing about 30%,
have been abused,
coerced into sex,
and beaten.
In Nigeria,
the Gender in Nigeria Report, 2012,
showed that one out of five women,
young girls between the ages of 15 to 24,
have experienced one form of violence or the other.
And for us at Project Alert,
in a report we released early this year
titled “Sexual Violence in Nigeria is Silent Epidemic,”
we analyzed 1,110 cases
reported at the Mirabel centre.
The Mirabel centre is the first sexual assault referral centre in the country.
When we analyzed this 1,110 cases,
it came out that 70% of the victims
have babies,
toddlers,
and infants, ages 0 to 17 years.
Four-month-old babies,
six years old,
five years old.
Violence against women and young girls knows no boundary.
We should not fool ourselves, it cuts across age,
it cuts across ethnicity,
religion,
educational status,
and social background.
Interestingly, as against men,
women and young girls are more at risk of violence from people they know,
people they love,
and people they trust.
The impunity that comes with violence against women
is so huge.
And that’s why most times, when people say victims don’t speak out,
the question is, when they speak out,
what happens?
Culture, tradition, religion combined together
further aid the perpetration of different forms of violence
against women and young girls.
Women in marriages are told to pray for the abusers.
Just keep praying for him.
They are told, divorce is a no.
And the question is, between the sanctity of life and the sanctity of marriage,
which comes first?
A dead woman is not a wife,
just like a dead man, too, will not be a husband.
Culture and cultural practices.
Several women have died in the search for the proverbial male child.
When your medical practitioners have told you,
“Don’t come back again madam.”
After this two, after this three, don’t come back again.
But the fear
of not having a male child sends them back repeatedly,
and some have gone that way.
You talk of widowhood rights
and practices just like papa Delly.
I tell people that …
no married Nigerian man dies a natural death.
It is only the unmarried ones that die a natural death.
Even if his plane fell from the sky,
his wife killed him.
Even if she was carrying him all around –
he was down with cancer, and everybody knows that for years,
she has been moving around with him –
she killed him.
And of course like papa Delly,
what an accident!
The wife killed him.
So, what do we do?
Are all men violent?
No.
My husband is right here.
My father was never violent,
and that is why I was shocked
when I turned 13 and started seeing these things happening as I grew up.
So, what is the missing link?
The anti violence campaign advocacy has been going on for so long.
But at this point, we need to build an important bridge,
and what is that bridge?
Working with men
and boys.
Violence is a learned conduct, and I thought it can be unlearned.
You know, when you are talking to men,
If you want to get a man’s undivided attention
on the issue of violence against women,
talk about daughters,
talk about sisters,
talk about mothers.
Forget about girlfriends and wives.
Yes,
those are game.
So, talk about daughters, talk about sisters,
talk about mothers.
We are going to schools, and we are talking to boys,
and then you tell a young boy there:
“How would you feel if you get back home,
and you open the door and say, ‘Hi mommy I’m back,’
and then you see three men raping her.”
It is totally unimaginable.
Are you a father,
the father to that young girl,
walking down the shopping mall with his daughter,
and then, one guy passes and brushes her butt
or says something crazy.
The men here, how would you respond to that?
Would you find that funny?
I don’t think so.
We need to engage men
as mentors,
as role models.
It is not all men that are abusive,
we need to give a voice to the men,
to the boys.
They all need a platform to stand on
and join us in speaking out against violence against women.
It is the right thing to do,
it’s is the right way to go.
And I thought I’d like to wrap up by saying
ending violence against women begins with men,
and as such, we must engage men,
we must engage boys
as our sons,
as our brothers,
as our fathers
in order to make sure that there is zero tolerance for all forms of violence
against women and young girls.
Thank you very much.
(Applause)
I come from a family of six children,
and I am the fifth.
Six children, I said, and not six girls that we really are.
And that’s because growing up in my family,
gender was never an issue.
My father used to tell us all
that you can be anything you want to be in life
for as long as you set your mind at it
and you walk towards it.
And that was it for me until I turned 13,
when I started becoming socially aware of the gendered nature of society,
and the violence and the discrimination
that women and young girls face.
It all started with papa Delly.
Papa Delly was my neighbor;
he was an Igbo man, so was his wife.
But I think papa Delly’s mum was Yoruba,
because all five children they had,
four girls and a boy,
all had Igbo and Yoruba names.
And interestingly,
both papa Delly and mamma Delly
were called by the name of the only boy and their last child, Delly.
And not the first child, as it is usually the case.
Now, Pappa Delly was involved in an accident
and was hospitalized for about three weeks before he died.
As soon as papa Delly died,
hell was let loose in his family.
His family accused the wife
of masterminding the accident that led to his death.
They actually said that she was a bad wife all along
and accused her of plotting to kill the only boy
in order to wipe out the name of their brother.
So, as soon as the funeral was over,
they forcibly took this little boy
and sent [him] and the four girls out.
Then, my auntie, my dad’s sister, beautiful woman, my dad loved her so much.
You know men and sisters,
and daughters.
And then she actually got married from a compound.
But barely six months into the marriage,
she kept running back home.
I remember vividly the final one,
that made me see so much anger on my father’s face,
I have never seen it before.
When she came back with torn clothes,
bloodshot eyes,
her nose bleeding,
and some scratches on her body.
Yet another fight.
Of course all the times she ran back, when my parents gave her shelter,
they sent for the man, and he would come with a bible,
and he would say it is the devil.
But on that last one,
my parents said no.
And then I went on to the university, and I had a roommate,
who had a boy friend, also an undergraduate,
always excited to go out on a date with this guy,
but most times coming back very sad and teary.
And then, years later when I started work,
there was this case of a man, a Nigerian man married to a Filipino woman
who had three girls,
and he was actually sexually abusing the eldest girl,
who was 12 at the time.
This girl tried running a couple of times.
Unfortunately for her, he would catch her,
and he would tell her, if you succeed in getting away,
then know that you are responsible for me moving down to your junior sister,
who was seven at that time.
Violence against women and young girls
is one of the most pervasive and endemic forms of human rights violation
the world over.
It can be physical in nature,
sexual, and psychological.
And this includes harmful traditional practices.
Male job preference,
female genital mutilation,
widowhood rights.
Around the world, one in three women,
representing about 30%,
have been abused,
coerced into sex,
and beaten.
In Nigeria,
the Gender in Nigeria Report, 2012,
showed that one out of five women,
young girls between the ages of 15 to 24,
have experienced one form of violence or the other.
And for us at Project Alert,
in a report we released early this year
titled “Sexual Violence in Nigeria is Silent Epidemic,”
we analyzed 1,110 cases
reported at the Mirabel centre.
The Mirabel centre is the first sexual assault referral centre in the country.
When we analyzed this 1,110 cases,
it came out that 70% of the victims
have babies,
toddlers,
and infants, ages 0 to 17 years.
Four-month-old babies,
six years old,
five years old.
Violence against women and young girls knows no boundary.
We should not fool ourselves, it cuts across age,
it cuts across ethnicity,
religion,
educational status,
and social background.
Interestingly, as against men,
women and young girls are more at risk of violence from people they know,
people they love,
and people they trust.
The impunity that comes with violence against women
is so huge.
And that’s why most times, when people say victims don’t speak out,
the question is, when they speak out,
what happens?
Culture, tradition, religion combined together
further aid the perpetration of different forms of violence
against women and young girls.
Women in marriages are told to pray for the abusers.
Just keep praying for him.
They are told, divorce is a no.
And the question is, between the sanctity of life and the sanctity of marriage,
which comes first?
A dead woman is not a wife,
just like a dead man, too, will not be a husband.
Culture and cultural practices.
Several women have died in the search for the proverbial male child.
When your medical practitioners have told you,
“Don’t come back again madam.”
After this two, after this three, don’t come back again.
But the fear
of not having a male child sends them back repeatedly,
and some have gone that way.
You talk of widowhood rights
and practices just like papa Delly.
I tell people that …
no married Nigerian man dies a natural death.
It is only the unmarried ones that die a natural death.
Even if his plane fell from the sky,
his wife killed him.
Even if she was carrying him all around –
he was down with cancer, and everybody knows that for years,
she has been moving around with him –
she killed him.
And of course like papa Delly,
what an accident!
The wife killed him.
So, what do we do?
Are all men violent?
No.
My husband is right here.
My father was never violent,
and that is why I was shocked
when I turned 13 and started seeing these things happening as I grew up.
So, what is the missing link?
The anti violence campaign advocacy has been going on for so long.
But at this point, we need to build an important bridge,
and what is that bridge?
Working with men
and boys.
Violence is a learned conduct, and I thought it can be unlearned.
You know, when you are talking to men,
If you want to get a man’s undivided attention
on the issue of violence against women,
talk about daughters,
talk about sisters,
talk about mothers.
Forget about girlfriends and wives.
Yes,
those are game.
So, talk about daughters, talk about sisters,
talk about mothers.
We are going to schools, and we are talking to boys,
and then you tell a young boy there:
“How would you feel if you get back home,
and you open the door and say, ‘Hi mommy I’m back,’
and then you see three men raping her.”
It is totally unimaginable.
Are you a father,
the father to that young girl,
walking down the shopping mall with his daughter,
and then, one guy passes and brushes her butt
or says something crazy.
The men here, how would you respond to that?
Would you find that funny?
I don’t think so.
We need to engage men
as mentors,
as role models.
It is not all men that are abusive,
we need to give a voice to the men,
to the boys.
They all need a platform to stand on
and join us in speaking out against violence against women.
It is the right thing to do,
it’s is the right way to go.
And I thought I’d like to wrap up by saying
ending violence against women begins with men,
and as such, we must engage men,
we must engage boys
as our sons,
as our brothers,
as our fathers
in order to make sure that there is zero tolerance for all forms of violence
against women and young girls.
Thank you very much.
(Applause)
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