Exposure to childhood violence leads to adult violence - Research

A preliminary report on the Nationwide Research on Domestic Violence in Ghana has shown that "exposure to violence in childhood is strongly related to the likelihood of an individual being a victim or perpetrator of violence in adulthood".

Poverty, unemployment and economic shocks were also identified as drivers of domestic violence in the research that covered 4,995 households.

Carried out for Ghana's Domestic Violence Secretariat of the Ministry of Gender, Children and Social Protection, the research was conducted by the Institute of Development Studies, United Kingdom (IDS), Ghana Statistical Service, Dr. Elizabeth Asante of the Institute of Statistical, Social and Economic Research and Ms. Sheila Minkah-Premo of the Apex Law Consult. lt was funded by the UK Department for International Development.

The findings were presented by Prof Patricia Justino, Study Director of IDS and Co-director of the Households in Conflict Network at an event organized by the Ministry of Gender, Children and Social Protection on "Sexual and Gender-Based Violence (SGBV) in Ghana : Response, Prevention and Elimination" at the United Nations headquarters in New York on Monday, (March 21, 2016) on the margins of the 60th Session of the UN Commission on the Status of Women.

lt came out that 'Women with no education were generally less likely to experience domestic violence", she stated.

The findings on the incidence, attitudes, determinants and consequences of domestic violence further showed that 27.7 per cent of women and 20 per cent of men in Ghana had suffered various forms of SGBV. It portrayed that 11.6 per cent of women and 7.79 per cent of men suffered from social violence , whilst 12.8 per cent of women and 7.3 percent of men suffered form economic violence.

The outcome, Prof. Justino, the Lead Researcher said showed that even though attitudes against domestic violence was strong and widespread, some forms of physical violence were acceptable. These included wife beating as a punishment against disobedience and neglect of children.

Interestingly, she said "rape was considered to be the fault of woman if she wore revealing clothes".

It emerged that young women and men between 15 and 19 years were more likely to experience domestic violence than other groups.

To address the problem, Nana Oye Lithur, Minister of Gender, Children and Social said Ghana has built on the United Nations declaration on the elimination of gender violence and has also prohibited all harmful cultural practices.

The Minister revealed that national responses had been strengthened to end the SGBV. The measures included the rigid enforcement of existing laws, increase in reportage of such cases and having specialized courts.

She identified social, cultural, traditional and religious factors, inadequate capacity of law enforcement and institutional social services and health care providers as some of the challenges being tackled in a consistent manner.

Nana Oye Lithur, mentioned that current statistics showed that 27 per cent of women in Ghana have been sexually assaulted in their lifetime.

Another research conducted in 2002 also revealed that 11.2 per cent of children interviewed had been victims of rape, 90.3 per cent of whom were female.

In other research, three out of 10 women said they were forced by their partners to have sex, amounting to rape, the Minister stated..

Dilating on the situation, the Minister mentioned that there were several types of gender violence including female genital mutilation(FGM), child marriages, and sexual assault that were being tackled through legislation and enforcement of laws.

A total of 57.1 per cent of sex workers said they had had unprotected sex with policemen against their will ,the Minister disclosed. In addition they also suffered very high verbal abuse after their arrest.

Nana Oye Lithur, revealed further that out of 1,547 domestic violence cases reported to the police only 160 was successfully convicted, representing 10.3 per cent of the total.

The Minister expressed her unhappiness that very few of the hundreds of SGBV cases reported ended up in conviction.

On SGBV in schools, Nana Oye Lithur said recent investigations had showed that sexting and ponorgraphic materials were shared and watched by students, aside passing sexual comments. She added that a third of teachers said they had heard or seen students watching pornography, whilst 67 per cent reported that sexual comments were passed.

Earlier, Ambassador Martha Ama Akyaa Pobee, Permanent Representative of Ghana to the United Nations called for effective implementation of all the laws and policies that have been passed to combat SGBV since the problem still existed.

"What do we need to do beyond legislation", she asked in her opening remarks at the programme that drew a sizeable crowd, mostly the diplomatic corps and civil society organizations, most of whom expressed admiration for the way Ghana was handling the SGBV situation.

Mrs Laadi Ayii Ayamba, Chair of the Parliamentary Committee on Gender in Ghana identified the lack of effective implementation of the existing laws as the main problem in addressing the problem, saying that FGM is still taking place in some neighbouring countries and therefore supported efforts to tackle the problem through a regional approach to prevent perpetrators running to neighbouring countries to commit the same crimes.

At her turn,the Ranking Member for the Committee on Gender in Ghana's Parliament, Mrs. Gifty Kusi called for more funding to tackle the SGBV, else not much could be achieved. She also supported calls for a concerted effort by the regional block to end sexual violence across the region since the problems are common.

Contributing,Madam Mercy Nii Djan, Greater Accra Chair of the Market Women Association praised the efforts by the Ministry to get the message on gender violence to the grass roots and other vulnerable groups. She noted that the establishment of various centres at the market to deal with gender violence is in the right direction because it has now made it easy for the traders to report such offences for appropriate action.

The occasion was used to introduce Ms. Hilary Gbedemah, Ghana's candidate for re-election to the Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW),a body of independent experts that monitors implementation of the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women.