“Why do we hate women so much?” That was the question posed by former independent senator Diana Mahabir-Wyatt on Monday as she addressed heads of NGOs, ministry representatives and other groups at a breakfast seminar to commemorate the International Day of Violence Against Women at Capital Plaza, Port-of-Spain.
Mahabir-Wyatt also noted that many such seminars had been held but not much developed out of them. “We tend to talk about things, but we do not do them,” she added. She said she became aware of how terrible the hatred for women was when, in the 1960s, a report indicated that a Sea Lots woman had a piece of BRC hammered into her and it eventually came out of her nose.
Mahabir-Wyatt, a director in consultancy firm Personnel Management Services Ltd, said when a silent march was held recently by the Rape Crisis Centre and the Coalition Against Domestic Violence in memory of the women lost to domestic violence, only 30 people showed up to the march. “It seems to me we have not gotten all that far about what we are doing about violence against women,” she said.
Prime Minister Kamla Persad-Bissessar, in her address to the nation in commemoration of the day, called for a firm stance to be taken against violence against women. She added that the Government, in seeking to secure a safe environment for women and girls, was adopting and implementing national action plans that raised awareness and establishing more campaigns and groups that support women and girls, among others.
Mahabir-Wyatt highlighted several forms of violence against women, among them emotional abuse, institutional abuse, educational and economic abuse. Saying that a PhD study currently being done had highlighted that only a small percentage of rape cases were reported. She said the system was stacked against women. She added that men-against-men was the highest percentage of gender-based violence while women abusing children constituted the second most common form of gender-based violence in the country.
“The things mothers do to children are appalling,” she said. Employment abuse, she said, still existed, whereby women earn only 72 per cent of what men did for work of the same value, even though women have to work harder to be qualified. Girls, she added, were also getting into the same kind of violence seen in young males. She called on those gathered and others to become actively involved.
Younger people, Mahabir-Wyatt said, needed to become involved in the fight to end violence against women, noting that many in the room were over 50. Gender Minister Clifton De Coteau, who delivered the feature address, said the ministry was working with the police on the issue and seeking to work with the Ministry of Education to educate younger people on respecting others. Asked about the gender policy, he said: “It is before Cabinet and it is being considered.”
Asked about the timeframe for its implementation, De Coteau repeated that it was before Cabinet. Asked about the legislative reforms needed, which he had touched on in his address, De Coteau said: “There is a legislative agenda brought before Cabinet. It is now before the Finance and General Purpose (Committee) for discussion and then we take it from there.”