Message by Minister for Youth, Sports and Family, Marie-Celine Zialor, on the occasion of ‘16 days of activism against gender-based violence’ |26 November 2020
Minister Zialor
‘Orange the world: fund, respond, prevent, collect’
“For the past decade, Seychelles has joined the rest of the world to commemorate ‘16 days of activism against gender-based violence’ starting from November 25 which coincides with the International Day for the Elimination of violence against women, to December 10 when we celebrate Human Rights Day, indicating that the world still faces many challenges to all forms of violence, especially against women and girls.
“This year’s theme focuses on what we, as individuals and as communities are asked to do in order to redress and mitigate this scourge. Over these next 16 days, we are being called upon to dedicate ourselves to the prevention of violence against women and girls, advocate on their behalf, and also seek innovative ways to develop interventions and programmes to address the challenges being faced. Put simply, we must ‘walk the talk’.
“In the midst of all these challenges, the ministry is very much committed to bringing awareness and empowerment of our young girls so that they are not seen as the pawns of the ‘stronger sex’ especially when it comes to dating violence, and for older women who sometimes fear to stand up for themselves; not forgetting our boys and men to help them become agents of change in their families and their communities.
“Despite the restrictions brought by Covid-19, the Orange day campaigns were maintained but were conducted on another platform: a prevalence GBV theme was published on the 25th of every month in Seychelles NATION and TODAY in Seychelles. Nonetheless, conventional public awareness activities are being done but on a lower scale. Indeed, last week we joined with other stakeholders to conduct a short session with young teenage girls from Praslin secondary school on a new campaign on ‘Empowering Girls for a Gender-based violence Free Society’. Similarly, we are pleased to have worked with a group of young men in our ‘Training of Trainers’ programme’ who want to become responsible, resilient, and respectable adults in society and help educate their peers on gender-based violence. Today, these young men have agreed to start an association to officially start their work and we at the family ministry will give them our full support.
“The quest against GBV is one that can only be won hand in hand with vital stakeholders. We are grateful to all our partners who have joined us in the arena, but there is much to be done. The Domestic Violence Act, 2020 once in operation will facilitate the coordination of various sectors to offer the best assistance to victims of violence. We are counting on this multi-sectoral approach to improve the implementation of laws, provide effective support services for GBV survivors, and thus bringing about the behavioral changes which our society needs so much.
“I urge victims and survivors of gender-based violence not to stay silent but to come forward. To the perpetrators, we are urging you to stop and to be more compassionate towards others. Let us continue to promote: peaceful living, peaceful homes and peaceful families, and most importantly a GBV-free Seychelles!”