Monday 30 April 2012

2012 is an even year and that means something in the Sebei Region - FGM!

The dreaded time of the year 2012 (for some) is fast approaching.  2012 is an even year and in the Sebei and Pokot region, the surgeon's blade will be the language come December. Young girls will either be forcefully OR ignorantly circumcised or they will turn up for FGM because they believe that it is cultural and one must never go against culture. Sadly, women who refuse to undergo female genital mutilation (FGM) in Pokot and Tepeth communities in Karamoja sub-region are forcibly cut by traditional birth attendants while delivering. The law against FGM is in place and the Sabiny contributed to its formation, according to sources interviewed by EASSI. It was not imposed on them at all, rather it was through participatory dialogue. Kenya, Uganda's neighbor to the East also banned the unkind cut in 2011, months after Uganda. And now the East African Community is to legislate against FGM.
Plans are underway to implement an FGM law at a regional level, Dora Byamukama, a legislator at the East African Legislative Assembly (EALA) member recently revealed. “One of the fundamental principles of the East African treaty is that member states observe human rights which include women’s rights. This principle also calls for legislation against harmful practices like FGM. 
Beyond the blade, what are these woman and gils being subjected to?
HIV/AIDS, Obstructed labor, permanent damage to their bodies, DEATH is the extreme! Must we even have a law against a practice that leads to these kinds of burdens on the victims and their families?
Without even looking at the law and others that are yet to come, how about door to door awareness campaigns? community conversations and yes education campaigns - or literacy campaigns. With matters of life and death, are income generating alternatives even viable? changing mindsets with the end results of FGM as the center of focus are enough a starting point for surgeons, strong believers in culture and the victims - willing and unwilling. Unrelenting advocacy against FGM is what needs to be done. Lets not leave anyone in the dark.
EASSI is at this for the year 2012 - and we are sure that the results will be there.

Bare breasts and the naked face of official brutality

Several armed riot police swooped on Turinawe’s car to stop her from travelling to an opposition rally.
One officer then repeatedly went for her right breast, squeezing it violently as Turinawe screamed and fought him. Eventually, she was yanked out of her car and bundled into a police van.
Until now, police and other security officers who crack down violently on the opposition in Uganda have been promoted.
Indeed, at the height of the Walk to Work protests by the recently banned Activists for Change (A4C), a senior officer who did not violently break up one of the walks was demoted to oversee a decrepit police garage.
The difference this time was that the breast-attack on Turinawe was not just bizarre, but disturbing in a strange sort of way.
The video of the attack that was posted on YouTube sparked notably angry responses.
There are many other stories in this, though. In the 1990s, East Africa witnessed the rise of militant street political activism by women.
Kenya was the epicentre, and the late Nobel laureate Wangari Maathai the poster girl of the movement.
Women’s activism seemed to die down in the mixed democratisation wave that swept the region, but is now on the rise again.
In Kenya, activist Ann Njogu has been flying the new flag. In Uganda, Turinawe is the face of the new feminism.
There is something unnerving about Turinawe. Literally every other month, she is either beaten up by security officers (sometimes badly), or is arrested, or is in court.
She most spends more time in hospital, prison, at rallies, and in court than in her house. No matter how much she is struck down, she will get up and defy power again.
Second, it is reveals a striking pattern in the way East African Men of Power use intimate body parts to terrorise their people.
In West Africa, both rebels and unruly government soldiers like to cut off the genitals of their male opponents and eat them.
Sourced from the East African Newspaper

Today it is Ingrid, but tomorrow it will be you

The word revulsion does not capture the feeling, but it comes quite close to describing my reaction to images of last week’s sexual assault on Ingrid Turinawe, the leader of the FDC Women’s League, which was perpetrated by a Uganda Police officer, acting on behalf of the ruling regime. Most of the world did not have any doubt about what happened to Ms. Turinawe. The television images and still photographs reached us in Toronto, as they did all over the world, within minutes of the attack. Uganda’s image took another beating, made worse by the feeble response of the regime’s spokespersons, who could not bring themselves to call the attack what it was – a crime of sexual assault against a citizen. I choose my words very carefully and deliberately. So I invite you, Tingasiga, to note that I have not said “alleged sexual assault.” The crime committed by the policeman was captured live on video. Only those addicted to self-deception would waste time discussing the nature of the crime that was perpetrated against an innocent woman. I hear that the government spin-masters are claiming that the criminal police officer was a woman as if the gender matters. The only civilized action that the government must take against the policeman is to arrest him and charge him with assault causing bodily harm, sexual assault and other crimes that the learned fraternity is adept at compiling. One hopes that Ms Turinawe herself will launch a case against the policeman, the police and government. 

 http://www.monitor.co.ug/OpEd/OpEdColumnists/MuniiniMulera/-/878676/1396302/-/6ac25jz/-/index.html