BY JOACKIM KULE MUHESI
The United Nations Development Program (UNDP) has revealed that at least 56% of the Ugandan girls and women continue to experience physical, sexual or emotional violence.
The UNDP’s report was delivered today by Ms VwedeNwanneObahor, the Resident Representative in Uganda to the stakeholders in Kasese during the official opening and handover ceremony of the Gender Based Violence Shelter at Kasese District Local Government.
The report indicated that violence was on an increase in the communities across the country.
Obahor noted that the national data reveals that 56% of the girls and women both in Kasese and other districts across the country continue to suffer from violence in different forms.
She explained that 35% of the girls and 17% of the boys experience sexual violence before turning 17 years while 34% of the girls are married off before their18th birthday, calling for combined efforts towards fighting the vice among the communities.
The Kasese District Senior Community Development Officer, Queenqonda Asiimwe’s situational report for the district highlighted that the United Nations Sexual and Reproductive Health Agency (UNFPA) ranked Kasese the 3rd in the country after reporting 7,319 cases of teenage pregnancies during the covid-19 pandemic.
She also indicated that the data review at the police by the International Justice Mission during the Justice Analysis gap, indicates out of the 147 cases reported at the time of review, aggravated defilement accounted for 54% in Kasese.
Asiimwe also presented that in 2020/2021, 33,370 cases of violence were reported from the district in all the lower local governments, adding that the children who were defiled by their biological parents in 2019 were 84 and 120 in 2020 among other reported casesbetween 2019 and 2020 only.
The Kasese Chief Administrative Officer, Mr. Paul Walakira attributed the rise in the number of violence cases in the district to the high levels of poverty hence forcing the parents to marry off their children at an early age.
He called for more sensitization about the dangers of alcoholism and polygamy in order for the people to produce the children that are affordable basing on their economic standards.
The Commissioner for the Ministry of Gender, Labour and Social Development who is in-charge of Gender Based Violence Prevention, Ms Angella Nakafeero said that the increasing levels of violence in the country was the reason why they established GBV shelters in spot districts including Kasese, Tororo, Masaka, Nebbi, Telego and Moroto among others .
According to her, shelters are also meant to get space for the victims to access counselling services, legal aid, mediation and capacity building.
She called upon the leaders in Kasese to put in place strategies of reducing the alarming levels of violence in the district.
ENDS