The chief executive officer of Social Innovation Africa, Anatu Ben-Lawal, has said the creation of more entrepreneurial hubs in rural areas will salvage the rise of gender-based violence.
She explained this will create more jobs in rural areas to make the women more financially independent.
“We should critically look at female production centers in rural areas. When everything is centralised in Accra and major cities, then it also causes migration and all the vices that come with it and women getting raped on the way unnecessarily,” she said in an exclusive interview with Asaase News.
COVID-19 gives rise to violence against women
The COVID-19 pandemic in 2020 resulted in lockdowns, social restrictions, and school closures. Ghana’s Domestic Violence and Victim Support Unit (DOVVSU) says this period led to the abuse of many women and girls in Ghana and beyond.
Per statistics from the Accra regional office of DOVVSU, about 31% of Ghanaian women were victims of gender-based violence during the peak of the COVID-19 pandemic.
It is in this light that the United Nations Population Fund (UNPA) together with some stakeholders held a panel discussion organized by the Africa Skills Hub on the theme, “Sexual and Gender-Based Violence and Post COVID Innovation” to among other things provide women with entrepreneurial skills to make them more financially independent.
Speaking at the programme, gender advocates, Kubilla Juliana Tindana and Tolha Anisatu who spoke on behalf of Northern women stated that gender-based violence was at its peak during the pandemic because many women lost their jobs and had to depend on men for survival.
Meanwhile, a gender advocate, Joyce Okyerewaa Danso also in an interview with Asaase News recommended that “there should be some level of orientation that is given to men.”
“It should be enforced traditionally and nationally that they should understand that a woman is a partner and a helper and not someone they need to attack,” she said.
The Africa Skills Hub launched phase one of a research report on “The Impact of COVID-19 on Gender Equality: Women’s Empowerment and the rise of new opportunities through business and innovations” at the programme.
Priscilla Seyram Abdallah
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