United Nations Economic Commission for Africa African Centre for Gender and Social Development (ACGSD) VIOLENCE AGAINST WOMEN IN AFRICA: A SITUATIONAL ANALYSIS Table of Contents Background Methodology Common Abbreviations Situation Analysis of Africa Algeria Angola Benin Botswana Burkina Faso Burundi Cameroon Cape Verde Central African Republic Chad Comoros Congo Cote D’Ivoire Djibouti Democratic Republic of Congo Egypt Equatorial Guinea Eritrea Ethiopia Gabon Gambia Ghana Guinea Bissau Guinea Kenya Lesotho Liberia Libya Madagascar Malawi Mali Mauritania Mauritius Morocco Mozambique Namibia Niger Nigeria Rwanda Sao Tome and Principe Senegal Seychelles Sierra Leone Somalia South Africa Sudan Swaziland Tanzania Togo Tunisia Uganda Zambia Zimbabwe Background Violence against women is perhaps the most widespread and socially tolerated of human rights violations, cutting across borders, race, class, ethnicity and religion. The impact of gender-based violence (GBV) is devastating. The individual women who are victims of such violence often experience life-long emotional distress, mental health problems and poor reproductive health, as well as being at higher risk of acquiring HIV and intensive long-term users of health services. In addition, the cost to women, their children, families and communities is a significant obstacle to reducing poverty, achieving gender equality and ensuring a peaceful transition for post-conflict societies. This, in conjunction with the mental and physical health implications of gender-based violence, impacts on a state or region’s ability to develop and construct a stable, productive society, or reconstruct a country in the wake of conflict. Gender-based violence in Africa, as elsewhere in the world, is a complex issue that has as its root the structural inequalities between men and women that result in the persistence of power differentials between the sexes. Women’s subordinate status to men in many societies, coupled with a general acceptance of interpersonal violence as a means of resolving conflict, renders women disproportionately vulnerable to violence from all levels of society: individual men, within the family and community, and by the state. In 1993, the UN Declaration on the Elimination of Violence against Women offered the first official definition of gender-based violence: Article 1: Any act of gender-based violence that results in, or is likely to result in, physical, sexual or psychological harm or suffering to women, including threats of such acts, coercion or arbitrary deprivations of liberty, whether occurring in public or in private life. Article 2 of the Declaration states that the definition should encompass, but not be limited to, acts of physical, sexual, and psychological violence in the family, community, or perpetrated or condoned by the State, wherever it occurs. These acts include: spousal battery; sexual abuse, including of female children; dowry-related violence; rape, including marital rape; female genital mutilation/cutting and other traditional practices harmful to women; non-spousal violence; sexual violence related to exploitation; sexual harassment and intimidation at work, in school and elsewhere; trafficking in women; and forced prostitution. The 1995 Beijing Platform for Action expanded on this definition, specifying that gender-based violence includes violations of the rights of women in situations of armed conflict, such as: systematic rape, sexual slavery and forced pregnancy, forced sterilisation, forced abortion, coerced or forced use of contraceptives, prenatal sex selection and female infanticide. It further recognised the particular vulnerabilities of women belonging to minorities: the elderly and the displaced; indigenous, refugee and migrant communities; women living in impoverished rural or remote areas; and women in detention.1 Although violence against women has begun to receive more attention globally over the last two decades, the scourge of violence against women in Africa particularly is still largely hidden. This is so for a number of reasons: the predominance of the system of patriarchy across Africa has meant that women are still perceived of and treated as subordinate to men; violence against women is accepted as the cultural norm in many societies and is often condoned by community and sometimes state leaders; the stigma attached to female victims of violence has resulted in very low rates of reporting; and often if women do report violence against them, they are either turned away because the authorities see 1 United Nations. 1993. 48/104: Declaration on the Elimination of Violence Against Women (A/RES/48/104); and United Nations. 1996. The Beijing Declaration and the Platform for Action: Fourth World Conference on Women: Beijing, China: 4-15 September 1995 (DPI/1766/Wom), paras. 114-116. violence against women as a matter to be dealt with privately or within the family, or they struggle to access justice in a criminal justice system that is not informed by or sensitive to the needs of women. These factors result in a dearth of information and data about violence against women across Africa, and this affects the ability of policy makers to: guide legislative and policy reforms; ensure adequate provision of targeted and effective services; monitor trends and progress in addressing and eliminating violence against women; and assess the impact of measures taken. 2 It is imperative that accurate and comprehensive data are gathered on violence against women in order both to increase societal awareness around the issue and to ensure that nation states are acting to eradicate violence against women and can be held accountable for their progress or lack of it. The prevention and reduction of gender-based violence requires strong global, continental and national commitments and instruments together with effective leadership to build the resources and capacity of service providers and the community at the local level. The national commitment to eliminate violence against women and girls can be realized when all members of the society including the government, community based organizations, family members and individuals take leadership and accept responsibility to work together to create a society that does not condone violence and works publicly and directly to prevent and respond to violence. One of the major obstacles to the prevention, reduction and eradication of gender-based violence is that it remains largely invisible and its victims largely silent, due both to a wide socio-cultural acceptance of this form of violence as well as the stigma attached to the victims of gender-based violence. As such, gender-based violence is difficult to quantify, meaning that there is no reliable way to measure the extent of the problem or the progress made in preventing and reducing the problem. In this regard, governments, NGOs, civil society and individuals need indicators that can assist them to measure the scope, prevalence, causes and consequences of the problem as well as the efforts undertaken to eradicate GBV. In addition establishing mechanisms to gather data and information on the above-indicated issues using developed indicators is crucial. However, availability of specific and contextual indicators and methodologies at continental as well as national levels are extremely limited in Africa. The report of an Expert Group Meeting held on indicators for measuring violence against women in October 2007 reiterates that: Widespread and consistent use of an agreed indicator, or set of indicators, would be an incentive for States to collect data on violence against women and monitor the extent of such violence in a more systematic way. Such efforts would contribute to strengthening the knowledge base on violence against women. Availability of knowledge about violence against women would result in better informed legislative and policy reforms and strategy development to address and eliminate violence against women.3 The African Centre for Gender and Social Development (ACGS) of United Nations Economic Commission for Africa (UNECA) is charged with providing the necessary technical support to member countries on the African continent to achieve gender equality. As such, ACGS/UNECA has committed itself to narrow the gaps in preventing and eradicating GBV by establishing a standard set of indicators specific to African countries, and to develop/establish data collection methodologies which can be used by member countries, civil society and other development stakeholders which are engaged with similar 2 United Nations Division for the Advancement of Women (UNDWA), United Nations Economic Commission for Europe (UNECE), United Nations Statistical Division (UNSD) (October 2007). Indicators to Measure Violence against Women: Report of the Expert Group Meeting, 8 – 10 October 2007, Geneva, Switzerland, p. 5. 3 Ibid, p. 3. endeavours. Moreover, ACGS/UNECA is committed to encouraging national governments across Africa to institutionalise the developed GBV indicators into their national systems. The following section gives a brief overview of the situation regarding violence against women for each country in Africa. For each country, the following information is given: a situation analysis of gender-based violence in that country, the gender machinery available in the country, the legislative framework in the county and the methodological approaches used by the country to collect data on violence against women. Methodology This situation analysis was conducted by