IS GBV BIASED?

Sir,

Kindly allow me space in your widely read publication to vent my view concerning the one-sided perception of gender-based violence (GBV). It hurts to the bone when one realises how the word gender-based violence has been twisted, revealing men as being vicious, ferocious and otherwise. If a man is abused, it is just an everyday occurrence, actually I bet even law enforcers can ignore that man if he reports the matter.

Ponder

Are men not human I ponder? No one takes time to scrutinise why men perform this type of degenerate acts of femicide, when will the time come for a male to be treated as mortals too? As an aspiring journalist, I took a quest into finding the causes of the spiralling femicide cases. In my quest, I met an inmate, who was charged with conspiracy, stalking and murdering his fiancée, in my inquisition. He said; “The drive of the murder was shun upon, I blurred my confession but it fell off on deaf ears. I groaned inwardly, and kept quiet, from a stack of hammer and tongs. I was quaking in one’s boots because I knew I only had me and myself on my side. I was told to man up, swallow my cries and take the consequences of my actions.

Outbursts

Outbursts of anger emotions transpired while my heart sunk. It was hues and cries but I had no courage to bluff it all out. I sobered between cries, I’m sorry, I’m remorseful! Unfortunately the matter elapsed.” After such a heartfelt conversation, I discovered that the so-called crude saying ‘indvodza ayikhali’ has caused havoc.

Stop

It has done mainly us men wrong, turning us into, if I would invent a word ‘pain keepers’. I stand as a proud liSwati to say stop the stigmatisation of gender-based violence because if that’s not done, the worst is yet to come. However, a lot more needs to be done to stop GBV.

Right to Reply

Sir,
 
Thank you for the time to raise your concerns about how men are treated in cases of gender-based violence. It is true that for a while now the ‘boy child’ has been neglected by society, especially organisations that work on children’s rights. The reason has been simply that for many years most cases of violence have been against females, in particular the girl child.

However, with the enactment into law of the Sexual Offences and Domestic Violence Act of 2018, the law is equal before the courts, be it male or female.
Males have taken it upon themselves to report GBV acts committed to them by their partners. It will not be easily achievable, but the spade work has been done especially with organisations like Kwakha Indvodza, which have been formed to deal in particular with male social challenges.  

Ed  

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