Spousal violence is a crime; report all cases – CHRAJ

Mr Shadrach Majisi, an officer of the Commission for Human Rights and Administrative Justice (CHRAJ), has called on women to report all forms of violence perpetrated by their partners for the appropriate action.

He said quite often many women have kept quiet over abuses and violence perpetrated against them by their partners and refuse to report with the excuse that, they had to endure such abuses for the sake of their marriages.

Mr Majisi said “violence and abuse against women irrespective of relationship was a crime that must not be tolerated by any individual”.

Speaking at a forum organized by the Department of Gender under the Ministry of Women, Children and Social Protection in Koforidua, he said statistics reveals that gender based violence was on the increase and that many women suffered various forms of deformities and even death from gender based violence and abuse.

The forum was held to sensitize women groups in Koforidua and its environs on gender based violence in the wake of reports of kidnapping, human trafficking and sexual abuse of minors among others.

Ms Juliana Abbeyquaye, the Acting Eastern Regional Director of the Department of Women, said incidence of gender-based violence over the years has not been given the needed attention and due to poverty many women also refuse to report such incidences for fear of losing their marriages.

She said on the contrary, the fear of losing a marriage or enduring abuses for the sake of the children; has resulted in deformities and even in some cases death which robbed the very children they were protecting of a mother; and called on women to be each other’s keeper and report such incidences for appropriate redress.