English
Kinyarwanda
The countrywide awareness campaign against gender based violence and child ended on September 30 with a call for Rwandans to unite against such human rights challenges in their communities.
The Minister for Internal Security, Sheikh Musa Fazil Harerimana presided over the official closing held in Kicukiro district, after a month of nationwide awareness activities.
The exercise was organized by Rwanda National Police in partnership with the ministries of Gender and Family Promotion, Health, Justice and One-UN Rwanda to further harness public ownership against GBV and child abuse, which are relatively still high.
It was conducted under the theme “Act together in Prevention and Response to GBV and Child Abuse.”
It is organized under the scale-up of Isange One-Stop Centre model whichstarted in 2009 as a pilot project at Kacyiru Police Hospital.
“To be able to fight and prevent the acts of GBV, we need to understand, identify and know how to address them collectively,” Minister Harerimana said.
“As Rwandans, we need to act together, make it a collective responsibility to address society issues including GBV and child abuse,” he added.
“Our President [Paul Kagame] has been exemplary and put special programs to promote gender equality and end child abuse, so we need to emulate this,” he noted.
He, however, noted that GBV and child abuse case have reduced tremendously since 2012 due to various measures initiated, but added that there is still a gap since some members of the public are yet to own this exercise.
About 1682 and 1445 cases of defilement were registered in 2012 and 2013 respectively. A total of 244 and 281 cases of rape were also recorded in that order, he added. Twenty five men were also killed by their spouses and 67 women killed by their husbands in the same years, he further explained.
The RNP and the government in general put in place various strategies to further combat and respond to GBV and child abuse challenges including the establishment and scale up of Isange One Stop Centre to offer medical and legal support to the victims.
Isange, which started in July 2009 at Kacyiru Police Hospital (KPH) as a pilot project is set to be established in all district hospitals across the country by 2017, to provide free psycho-socio, medical and legal services to adult and child survivors of gender based violence and child abuse.
“Victims of GBV and child abuse deserve to be given hope for the future instead of being isolated. Let’s learn how to openly address our family issues and report to police in time to ensure that justice is served, and victim is also attended too,” he said.
Clara Anyangwe deputy director of UN Women in Rwanda said the country has been exemplary in fighting GBV and Child Abuse, which should be emulated in other countries.
“Children, women and girls need to know their rights and men should be fully engaged in this process”. Anyangwe said
The closing exercise was also attended by the Minister of Gender and Family Promotion, Oda Gasinzizigwa, the IGP Emmanuel K Gasana, the Mayor of Kigali Fidel Ndayisaba, among others.
