Radio Miraya
2775: DEMOCRACY IN ACTION: Protection of Women in South Sudan
(upbeat music) - Hello and welcome to Democracy in Action with me, Sonny Martin, you are coming to your life from Cuba. This program comes to you every Saturday from nine to 10, and it's repeated in the evening hours, and wherever you are joining us right now, please you can also call us later on on 091-0620-79 or 091-062950. Today we are going to be looking at women's protection. All our women in South Sudan are supposed to be protected. There should be no gender-based violence or any violence or any form of violence against women in the country. That's what we are going to be discussing today, what can be done to protect the women of South Sudan from all forms of violence and support them, achieve their dreams like any other person or like their male counterparts. That's what we are going to be discussing and you can join us during our conversation here with my three guests who are already seated here with me in the studio. Let me begin by introducing them. We have Josephine Chanderu, who is the Executive Director. Stewart, women, you are most welcome to ready men. - Thank you, moderator. - And we also have Jim Arro, but Executive Director, Road to Economic Development, (speaking in foreign language) you are most welcome, this is not the first time to be here, you're all right. - Sure, it's not the first time. Thank you, Sonia Martin and all the listeners of Mira FM. - And we also have the United Nations mission in South Sudan, senior women's protection advisor, Sheila, welcome to the program. - Sandy, and also to all the listeners. - All right, first of all, let me begin by giving the chance to you as the senior protection advisor of ARMS. When we talk about women's protection, what does it mean in real terms? - I would like to start by saying that women's protection is one of those terms which has different facets to it. In my work, for me, when I look at women's protection, I concentrate on the protection of women from conflict-related sexual violence, and that means the violence which happens and which has a link to conflict. I'm sure my colleagues here would have other meanings for this, but my specific focus is on this. And we're looking at incidents and patterns of rape, gang rape, sexual slavery, forced prostitution, and other forms of sexual violence, of comparable gravity against women, men, girls and boys, that is directly linked to a conflict, and their protection in that particular context. - Okay, yes, just for not many people, knows keyword women organization. First tell us briefly about your organization and how do you protect women from violence in South Sudan? - Thank you, Marita. Moderators and listeners out there. Stood Women is a women-led organization. It's a national organization in South Sudan who we are established in 2009, and our major focus is provision of access to justice for women and girls, and so that is where our protection line focuses, and we are in several states, including Central Equatorial State, we are here in Juba, we work here with the courts, we work here with the on paralegos, we raise awareness to communities through the radio, through our neighborhood assemblies and dialogues, we bring together survivors here in Juba to discuss issues related to stigma facing them, not to access the necessary services. We are also working in Bohr, we are working in Rubcona County, we are in Pibor, we are in Maguin, Nimle, we are also now recently working in Wau and Raja, and so for Stood Women, working on protection of women means ensuring that women, who undergo violence are provided with access to justice, and so our access to justice component looks at established justice and confidence centers, and this is a strategy that is being used by the UN DP to establish justice and confidence centers, and these centers do provide numerous services, including psychosis support and legal counseling to survivors, they also provide legal education and facilitate legal awareness, they ensure that traditional chiefs are a capacity built together with the paralegos to ensure that they provide the needed justice to their communities since the statutory justice is not reachable to very many people. - So briefly, do you have any success story when you talk about access to justice for women? You can talk about? - Yes, we have a success story, for example, in 2020 Stood Women provided legal representation for the first child marriage case where a child was able to take her parents to court for marrying her off before she reached the age of 18, and the case was very successful, even though her parents were not taken to, they were not convicted in prison, but they were convicted to serve their sentence at home and they put a commitment letter that this girl will have to choose when she wants to get married. So they are not going to ever force her to get married against her will and before she attends the age of majority. - Okay, yes, and let's find out more from my Gamaro, but you are the executive director road to economic development organization. First, tell us how do you work for the protection of women because from the title here, it's a road to economic development organization. Tell us more about your NGO. - Yes, I think to connect the name of the organization to what we do is what drives us the principle on which the organization was founded was to mobilize communities, sensitize them and empower them towards peace and sustainable development. Now when we work towards peace and sustainable development, you must have a healthy community that exercises its human rights, its basic rights and to achieve peace. So you can't achieve peace without having peace, without having your protection and without your human right. So that is the connection. So how we offer what we do in terms of the subject matter to that topic, my colleague, we are all national angels and most of what my colleague has said we do, but specific to redo, specific to redo, is our primary target, of course, women and the children and we have two ongoing projects through which we are providing protection to women. The first one is through our victim support groups. We have grouped most of women who have been victims of gross human right violations. When we talk about gross human right violations, this includes, of course, women who are raped by armed men and this compose what my senior Sheila said. It's a conflict related sexual violence. They are members of our group, domestic violence at a high level. People who are victims of torture, they are in our group and the people whose family members were murdered in their presence. Those are people who have undergone traumatic events in their lives or in their communities. So to help them heal, we bring them into groups and each group has about 25 to 30 members and when we bring them into the group, we offer them psychosocial support. We take them through legal aid, many aspects of legal aid and especially referral pathway and we educate them. If tomorrow you need to access justice, this is where you can go. This is how you can approach the court. This is the authority you can meet to get justice for what happened to you. So in that form, in that groups, we are helping them get their protection and get their human rights, which they deserve. That's specific to radio. And of course here in Central Equatorial, we're also working at the GBV and the juvenile court to ensure victims of domestic violence or sexual violence get access to justice, get justice for what has happened to them. And very specific, we are also helping most of the women in Juba National Prison and the police stations across the seven police stations in Juba help them maneuver the justice system and get their release, those who are in months. So those are the kind of protection and the support we're giving to women. - Okay, and let's find out more from Sheila. Your definition was very classic and we want to find out from you, violence against women in politics is a pervasive and disturbing violation of human rights. And that's according to key messages on violence against women in politics and also by the UN Security Executive Committee on the 17th of January 2020. Now, the question is, how is armies supporting RT GONO to ensure that women can fully, equally, and safely exercise their rights to participate in the politics and in public life? - Thank you. I would like to start by saying that participation in public life is, in fact, through elections or different ways is, in fact, a human right which is protected by different human rights instruments. For example, it is guaranteed in the universal declaration of human rights and subsequent treaty provisions. Just quickly to say, I'm going to just read from the Universal Declaration of Human Rights because it's the one which gives the foundation for other treaties and other instruments, be it at the universal level or at the regional level. It says everyone has the right to take part in government, in the government of his country, directly, all through freely chosen representatives. That's Article 21 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Everyone has the right of equal access to public service in this country. And the third one is more in terms of how people can elect or express themselves in terms of whether it is through genuine elections or other means, but to have the possibility of expressing themselves to be represented by people they choose. So it starts from that. Then I would also say that having, you know, that as the basis of all the framework which comes under, which have been put in place later, there's the international civil, government on civil and political rights, for example, to which South Sudan is a party and they came to that. So how does violence come into the whole, you know, into this whole thing? In the context of electoral participation or processes, this remains a major obstacle in terms of realisation of the rights of women to participate in public and political life. One should, you know, if you go from that premise. So I would suggest, or I would in fact strongly suggest, not only suggest that violence against women in elections constitute a human rights violation prevents women from exercising their political rights and thus negatively affect society as a whole because it brings underrepresentation of women at all levels. Like, you know, women make up like half the world population. So if they are underrepresented already, it is, you know, a huge impact which needs to be, which affects society at all levels and which needs to be remedied. All right, and having had from Sheila, the enemy senior women's protection advisor, Josephine, I would like to find that from you. You have so much work with issues to do with women and you have been directly doing so many stakeholders and now you are operating nearly all over the country and the latest office of opinion is near agile. Like you say, that is in Western America, the state. When you talk to people who knows more about issues of women, what are the most common form of violence in this country against women and how can they be tackled or addressed? - Thank you. So violence would come in many forms. We could, I would like to start by saying we have violence that manifests itself in many ways. We have physical violence where we look at assault and slavery. We look at there's emotional or psychological violence as that one fits itself as verbal abuse or confinement. We have sexual violence, including rape. We have harmful practices such as child marriages and FGM. We have socioeconomic violence, which also includes denial of resources and sexual harassment, exploitation and abuse. But for the case of South Sudan and with my experience, I think I've worked a lot with the rape survivors. So I think rape is really very, very common in the country and then domestic violence. And this manifests itself really, really clearly even in the reports. But coming back to rape, for example, in South Sudan, you find that in a certain location, one form of rape manifests more than the other. Recently I was in Raja and there was mobile court going on and the mobile court was only prosecuting rape cases. You know, Raja is one of the most secure places in the country, I would say 100% secure. But you find that no other forms of violence are happening except rape. And I'm made to ask why. - What was the answer? - I haven't really asked anyone. I'm just asking myself, why is this so? - So the executive director was T word women, are you going to take it up and ask the relevant answer? It is why only rape cases are there no other form of violence happening against women in Raja county? - Exactly, this is what I want to learn. This is what I want to dig into. But I think I'm seeing Sheila's hand up and she's smiling. So, yeah. - Okay, yes Sheila. - Yes, thank you for this opportunity. I believe there are different answers to this particular question. However, there has been a move with regards to mobile courts to raise the profile of rape cases. That doesn't mean in any way that no other cases or no other criminal offenses are happening in that particular place. But sometimes there is the opportunity to say, okay, this is the kind of offense we want to look at in more depth and make it a sort of deterrent or example. So this is what I would say to this particular issue. - Yes, first of all, tell us, there are some people who are saying that most of the indigenous NGOs in South Sudan are focusing on issues which are known. You should go for the root causes. The perpetrators who are doing this are left out. You always target women, but you should really educate the male to know that what is happening because they are the victims always. When you talk about rape, it's a man raping a woman, not that way around. So what is being done to also carry more awareness among the men and tell them, look, all these form of violence we are hearing, being perpetrated allegedly by you is not correct. - That is a tough bill, but I will attempt to give my view as a director and having been operational in the country for quite a while. First of all, I want to kindly correct. It's not, when we talk about violence, it's not only women, men also suffer. - Okay. - Men are suffering silently because by our tradition and the culture, when you are a man, you're not supposed to cry publicly. So men also undergo, so how do you break that silence? - So we have been raising awareness. We talk with them and we take up their cases also. There are cases we have known of men who are suffering domestic violence. We're talking today about domestic violence. Men also do suffer and we have talked to a group of men capacitating them on what to do, how to break this. There's several awareness we do on that. It's happening. - To come back to your question on what we are doing to stop or minimize all these forms of violence against women. - Most of our intervention in this has been through our work with the GBV and the juvenile court. Where are we telling everyone through community, radio talks, community talks, we go to community and have a dialogue with the leadership structure of the community and telling them once this happens, you are a man, you're supposed to take this referral pathway. You're supposed to visit the court and take up the case and have justice also for yourself. So we're working with the men and we're telling everyone the GBV and juvenile court is not only for women because here in the local Arabic binadi, Makawab-tah-nous-wan, it's not Makawab-tah-nous-wan. It's Makawab-tah-ru-jal-nous-wan, Yal-a-ool-ad-ub-anat. So the court is there for everyone. That's the effort we are doing, raising awareness on the presence and the functions of this court and what services they offer. So most of the men are now getting, they are appreciating, some are visiting our office to say, I didn't know, I didn't know, thank you for letting us know this. So it takes much effort and it will take time for most community members, especially the male, to understand they are suffering. They also have a right to justice for this. Okay, yes, I just think I see how I point to the men. Yeah, I just wanted to, I don't know what am I saying, engaging on engaging men. For Stuart women, we are engaging men to end violence, I guess to women and girls, we are engaging these men and boys as allies. We've been implementing a strategy called Engaging Men and Boys for Countable Practices, that is IMAP. And by the end of that program, men started reporting cases of violence in the communities. The report is either related to a man or it is related to a woman or a girl or a boy. So men were becoming open, but they would sneak and report the issue. And at least it is known even if nothing is done or need. And then we also, this strategy also allows women to come out openly and begin to discuss issues facing them as opposed to if they were not informed that men are also allies. So women also increasingly started reporting cases of violence to the relevant authorities. So what are the legal frameworks in South Sudan? That requires the protection of women. We have a bit of several legal frameworks. First of all, our transitional constitution, our penal court, our child act, and even the local government act. And also in South Sudan, we also do-- How effective is this child act? Is it really very effective when it comes to protecting-- why am I asking this? Because you talked earlier about the issue of cultural norms. You gave an example of a child who had to fight a battle against a forced or early marriage. So how effective are these tools from what you are hearing? I want to read for you from section 26 to be of the child act related to the right of the girl child to own property. You know, property in South Sudan is a very, very big issue and is causing a lot of violence and breaking families. So this section stipulates that the girl child has equal rights to succession and inheritance to property and reason a provision out of the estate of the deceased parent without discrimination. But in practice, this law is not being applied the way it is. We are seeing that properties are being left to the boy's children or the boy or the boy's or the man. And if that is if there is property, the girls are being neglected. But the provision of the law under the child act and also under the constitution is very clear regarding the ownership of property. And if this happens, it becomes discrimination, it becomes a violation. OK. Yes, give up. Yes, I want to add on the legal framework in South Sudan. You know, becoming a nation in 2011, so far we are using most of the laws we came with from Sudan. What I want to say here is though our constitution in the Bill of Rights in our transitional constitution talks on right to litigation and right to fair trial, these are rights in the constitution which is applicable to everyone. Because whether a man or a woman, everyone is equal before the law. So this illegal framework is being used also. But as the national angels or as the CSOs, our push or our concern is it's not enough. Because these are laws that do not reflect the communities of South Sudan as of new nation. So in that sense, we have drafted and contributed to drafting an anti-GBB bill and a family law which are now bill and laid in the parliament for debate and enactment. So it's our hope that when this is passed through the parliament and we have these two laws, then it will add weight and the effectiveness to the legal framework that can be used to protect in our own context. Because most of the laws we have are not really too specific to South Sudan context. OK. Yes, Celah. Thank you. I just wanted to say that South Sudan recently ratified the Maputo Protocol, which is the protocol to the African Charter on the rights of women in Africa. And this was adopted by the African Union in 2003, 11th July in a few days. We'll be celebrating an anniversary. And what is more important, all that my colleagues have talked about, in fact, is taken within the context of the Maputo Protocol and brings more strength. For example, it guarantees extensive rights to women and girls and has progressive provisions on harmful traditional practices, just to say the child marriage you mentioned, as well as FGM, reproductive and health rights, economic empowerment, ending violence against women. Interestingly, it has two articles on conflict, women in conflict, in that particular protocol, which can be used by South Sudan women and men who fight against violence against women, as well as roles in political processes. I believe it is one of those very progressive instruments, which could be of use to South Sudan in the coming-- I mean, since the eradification. And more and more make use to be made use of. Thank you. All right. If you're just doing this right now, you're listening to Democracy in Action. My name is Sani Martin. We are coming to life from Juba. And our lines are now open. You can call us or send us your questions to our SMS number 091-2177141, or you can also call us life on 092-968629700912062950. Those are all our lines you can call. And we are discussing about women's protection. And in the study here, I have Josephine Chanderu, the executive director, Stewart Women, Jim Arrobert Kane, executive director, World Economic Development Organization, Orido. And we also have Sheila, who is the United Nations Mission in South Sudan, senior women's protection advisor. You can put your questions to them. And they will be talking about whatever you ask them. And they will answer all your queries. We do have a couple of SMS coming in here by our SMS number. This one is saying I am Dennis. Dennis is writing from Monoke. And he says, my question is going to anyone in the studio. What will it take to end all forms of violence against women and girls in this country? That's from Dennis in Monoke. Another SMS here is coming from Jackson. Jackson is also writing from Tomping here in Juba. He says, my question is going to the senior advisor of Annis. How is Annis supporting the stakeholders, the angels, who are working carelessly in the country to end for all forms of violence against women in this country? That's from Jackson in Tomping here. And another SMS here is coming from Wow with no name. He says, this is going to Josephine. And he says, my question to Josephine is, you said you have been to Raja. And Raja is one of the areas where it's only being reported about rape, rape, rape. How do you intend to empower the local chiefs in the areas you are working so that they can end forms of this form of forced marriage because this is connected to culture. He believed that if the chiefs or the local chiefs in areas where you operate empowered, this issue of early marriage will end because the chiefs are so much connected to their people and the people live in those villages. He has not sent us his name or her name. Yes, let's begin with the question of how is Annis supporting the stakeholders who are working hard to end all forms of violence against girls and the women in this country? Thank you for the opportunity. There are different ways whether we do that. For example, within the context of what we call the Joint Consultation Forum, which is a forum where there are civil society organizations focusing on work on CRS, the conflict related sexual violence and violence against women, we use that platform to discuss what would be strategies, what could be the best way forward, and how to deal with this scourge of conflict related sexual violence and violence generally. So we provide thus a platform for discussion, for reflection, and also we support action. That's the first. With the Women's Protection Advisory Unit, we engage with other stakeholders. For example, with the armed forces and the police, the armed forces have an action plan to address conflict related sexual violence in Sudan. So do the police. We work with their implementation committees so that we support them through technical cooperation so that they would themselves address what is found in the action plan that they've put forward for themselves. So we act as this group which supports to review what are the actions, what needs to be done, and how to ensure that messages with regards to, for example, zero tolerance of CRSB within the armed forces is taken through. We work together with them to put forward or to produce cards with key messages to end conflict related sexual violence, sexual violence generally in the army, and it is distributed. It's the same with the police. And I could go on like this in different ways where we engage with stakeholders, be it civil society, be it with the government authorities also, as well as armed forces and police to ensure that violence is addressed and strategies are found to address, to make tangible progress on dealing with these issues. - All right. Thank you so much, Asela. We go to Josephine's discussion about empowering the local chiefs so that they can foster this kind of awareness in their villages because they are so much connected to the people, the people who live under their rules. If you empower the local chiefs, the issue of early marriage or forced marriage may be minimized. I want you to take all this question together. We're just coming from Garang Malong Deng from Panto. He says here, we are lacking GBV and protection programs in our world's house. How do we expect women and girls to be secure when we don't have such kind of programs? When do we intend to roll out to our will? That's from Garang Malong Deng in Panto. That there are no programs at all for the protection of women against GBV. And he is really asking if this can be rolled out in that part of the country. Another SMS, also here coming from Daniel Madel, a quote from Guadeli, one here in Dubai. He says, I appreciate the topic. And he says, we should work hard to influence men to know that violence against men, more special help is not a very good act. Women need to be educated about the dangers of rapping. That's from Madel in Guadeli here. Yes, go ahead, Chris, Josephine, before we give the floor to Guima. Yes, I'll answer two questions. One from WoW and I will stop. To the person in WoW, I am really so excited that you brought this question up because Strudeman is currently working in WoW and Raja. So your question was related to empowerment of local chiefs. At the beginning of my presentation, I did share that under the justice and confidence centers, Strudeman is also working with empowering local chiefs and also community paralegos. For the local chiefs, we have trained the local chiefs on human rights approaches to handling their issues. We have ensured that cases that are not within their jurisdiction are referred to the relevant authorities that have the jurisdiction. We have also ensured that they understand the differences between civil and criminal cases. I could go on and on and on. But for the Strudeman approach, we don't just train chiefs and we leave them there. We engage them. We sign memorandum of understanding with them for the period for which we want to see their work and they give us monthly reports on what they are doing and on what we expect from them. And then at the end of the month, we do monthly meetings with them on the challenges they are facing in the administration of the justice based on the trainings that they received and what we can do together. So we have started this already in Raja. We have trained already seven chiefs. And as a women-led organization, we look forward to empowering women. We focus a lot on gender equality. So out of the seven chiefs, the three are women leaders. So there are three women leaders and four male chiefs. Okay, and if you can summarize because we have to leave the studio right in the next two minutes and the news is coming up. I would like to say we are already working with chiefs. For Garang Ma Long, we get your points. You're bringing out a mid and the need is already taken into account. Okay. Yeah, so we are coming to our will note. I will try to see if I can reach our will side. Thank you so much. Yes, Guima. And you summarized it finally in a minute. Yes, in one minute, I answered the question of my brother from Manuki, what it takes to end violence against women. Yes. And I want to say you are in the community. The first thing is we as a community members have to know our rights. Two is we have to work to preventing crime. All of us are to work to prevent this. And we have to work to protect our women. Don't say it is the government. It's us as a community structures to protect our women. And also we have to take a lead in prosecuting those who are committing this. If we do this, awareness, protection, prevention, and prosecution, we'll be able to stop or minimize violence against our women in the communities. Okay, and finally, Silla, your final remark as we conclude what we expect from here as we move forward towards ending all forms of violence against women and girls in this country. We've heard from our colleagues here and from the questions, there is one thing which comes forward. That is, addressing violence against women, which could lead to women's participation in political space, needs a multifaceted approach. And everyone has a responsibility in that. But all of us here, but also men who could be allies, if I make quotes from Josephine, in this process. It's not something we do on our own. Thank you. Thank you very much. And with that, we have come to the end of our discussion for today. I had Josephine Chandirak, executive director, Steve White-Women, and Gima Robert Khan, executive director, wrote to the Economic Development Organization of Rida. And we also had Silla, who is the enemy senior women's protection advisor. My name is Sany Martin. Thank you so much for listening. And join me next Saturday, same time, same weather station. Stay tuned to the rest of the programs. Coming up, bye-bye for now. [MUSIC PLAYING] [SUSPENSEFUL MUSIC] [SUSPENSEFUL MUSIC] [SUSPENSEFUL MUSIC] [SUSPENSEFUL MUSIC] [SUSPENSEFUL MUSIC] [BLANK_AUDIO]