Global Roundup: Kenyan Women's Groups Demand Action on Femicide, India Film Sex Abuse Report, South Sudanese Women's Storytelling, Bullying of LGBTQ+ Workers, Indigenous Woman Leader Mourned
Global Roundup: Kenyan Women's Groups Demand Action on Femicide, India Film Sex Abuse Report, South Sudanese Women's Storytelling, Bullying of LGBTQ+ Workers, Indigenous Woman Leader Mourned
Activists marched in Kenya in January against an alarming rise in murders of young women © Tony KARUMBA / AFP/File
Rebecca Cheptegei’s boyfriend poured petrol over her and set her ablaze at her home in western Kenya on Sunday Sept. 1 and she died in hospital on Thursday.
The 33-year-old Ugandan long-distance runner, who had recently competed at the Paris Olympics and was a mother of two young daughters, was the third female athlete to be killed in Kenya since 2021.
This is Femicide…First and foremost, the government needs to take a stance because the government doesn't really do anything about it. Most of this violence, gender-based violence, is not viewed as a crime…The patriarchal attitudes that we have in this country are abhorrent. -Njeri Migwi, the founder of Usikimye, an organisation that fights gender-based violence
The Africa Data Hub, working with data science company Odipodev and Africa Uncensored, estimate that between 2016 and 2023 more than 500 women were murdered.
Thousands of women protested in the capital Nairobi earlier this year, with rights groups urging the government to treat the deaths as a "national disaster".
The killing of Cheptegei follows the murder of two high-profile Kenyan athletes.
In October 2021, record-breaking Kenyan runner Agnes Tirop, 25, was stabbed to death at her home in the renowned Rift Valley running hub of Iten.
Her estranged husband is on trial over her murder and has denied the charges.
In April 2022, Kenyan-born Bahrainian athlete Damaris Mutua was also found dead in Iten in a suspected domestic violence incident.
Tirop's Angels, a group set up to combat gender-based violence after Agnes Tirop’s death, said Cheptegei's passing "painfully echoes the tragedy" that led to the formation of their organisation.
The shadow of this ongoing violence must not be ignored. We urge the public, sports bodies, and the government to unite in taking meaningful steps to protect women and girls, ensuring that no more lives are lost. -Tirop's Angels
Bina Paul, a founding member of the Women in Cinema Collective, poses for a portrait at a film institute in Kerala, India, September 2, 2024. Bina Paul/Handout via Thomson Reuters Foundation
The report by the three-member Hema Committee has rocked "Mollywood" - as the Malayalam film and TV industry is known - since its release last month, with a series of sex abuse allegations against some top male celebrities, resignations by men in powerful posts, as well as police investigations.
This must act as a wake-up call. Now there will be a lot more vigilance, women themselves will ask 'Am I owed anything?', and men certainly will - and should - be more vigilant. With this spotlight, social media, you cannot hide anymore. -Bina Paul, an award-winning film editor and founding member of the Women in Cinema Collective (WCC)
India's southern states, including Kerala, have vibrant and popular local language film industries, separate from the Hindi-language Bollywood.
The nearly 300-page report uncovered a range of problems faced by women, including poor working conditions such as a lack of female toilets and changing rooms on sets, a lack of legally binding contracts, irregular pay, wage gaps and demands for sexual favours in exchange for work.
Paul, with several other women in the movie industry, formed the WCC after the abduction and sexual assault of an actress in 2017.
Participants based in Kakuma Refugee Camp hold up signs with song names. Photo courtesy of Likikiri Collective via OkayAfrica
The women belong to the South Sudanese communities of Kakwa, Avokaya, Dinka and Nuer, and are brought together in Rhino Camp, Uganda and Kakuma, Kenya. They are participants in the project “Storytelling as Safeguarding: Protecting South Sudanese Women’s Cultural Heritage in Refugee Settings in Uganda and Kenya,” initiated by Likikiri Collective, a South Sudanese multimedia arts, culture and education organization.
“Likikiri” means “stories” in Bari, a language spoken across several communities in South Sudan, and names the foundation of the collective’s work which focuses on research and knowledge production, multimedia storytelling, training and education.
“Storytelling as Safeguarding” is a continuation of the work the collective has been doing for many years, drawing from a culture of didactic storytelling in South Sudan, and combining it with Story Circles. Women are invited to share, archive and discuss 400 traditional songs which offer comprehensive guidelines for a woman’s life — from adolescence, to marriage, child rearing, work and mourning.
We see ourselves as part of a broader movement across the continent, in the diaspora and around the world to move to more locally driven approaches to conflict resolution and community-driven research. -Rebecca Lorins, co-founder of Likikiri and professor at the University of Juba.
South Sudan’s wars in 2013 and 2016 divided the country economically, politically and socially, and it has become rare for people to carve out spaces for talking. “People’s free time is filled with a lot of anxiety and maybe depression,” says Lorins. “But you'll hear a lot of people say: ‘the elders used to tell us stories at night.’”
South Sudanese cultural activist Elfatih Atem, co-founder of Likikiri, adds that Story Circles give the community ownership of their own narratives and problems, in their own language.
Why songs? Song is used by women to articulate their positions on difficult or sensitive topics. It allows us to step out of ordinary discourses and the rules regulating those ways of speaking, and becomes a legitimate avenue for voicing critique or expressing [ourselves]. In this project, we have seen the ways women use lullabies and work songs to lament, express grievances or speak up on other sensitive issues. -Rebecca Lorins
A survey of 1,000 LGBTQ+ people, conducted for the Trade Union Congress (TUC), revealed that 52 per cent of respondents have been bullied or harassed at least once at work.
The survey, carried out by Number Cruncher Politics, also revealed that 19 per cent of queer employees had been exposed to verbal abuse within the past five years. More than a quarter said they had homophobic, biphobic or transphobic remarks directed at then or made in their presence.
And five per cent reported experiencing physical violence, threats or intimidation because of their sexual orientation.
It’s is not surprising to learn that nearly 30 per cent of LGBTQ+ people remain in the closet at work, the TUC concluded.
On every measure, Gen Z queer workers, those aged between 18 and 24, experience higher levels of discrimination in “the office”, according to the survey.
Compared to the full sample of respondents, 65 per cent of queer Gen Z members of staff said they had experienced some form of bullying, harassment and discrimination in the past five years. Twenty per cent said they were bullied because of their sexual orientation, compared with 11 per cent of LGBTQ+ workers of all ages.
Another group marked out were transgender employees, with 79 per cent of trans respondents having experienced bullying at work, compared with 48 per cent of the full sample.
This new report shines a light on the extent of discrimination LGBT+ workers face in our workplaces. LGBT+ people should be safe and supported at work. But, instead, they’re experiencing shockingly high levels of bulling and harassment – including assault. Workplace culture clearly needs to change. -TUC general secretary Paul Nowak
Assembly of Manitoba Chiefs Grand Chief Cathy Merrick, seen in a 2023 photo
Cathy Merrick, the first woman to become grand chief of the Assembly of Manitoba Chiefs, is being remembered as a "remarkable leader" and a "true matriarch," as tributes poured in from leaders across Canada after her sudden death on Friday.
Merrick was speaking to media about a court case outside the law courts building in Winnipeg early Friday afternoon when she collapsed. She was given CPR before being rushed away in an ambulance.
Merrick is survived by her husband, Todd, three children and eight grandchildren, a friend confirmed to CBC. She was 63 years old, according to the Assembly of Manitoba Chiefs.
Merrick, the former chief of Pimicikamak Cree Nation (also known as Cross Lake) in the Canadian province of Manitoba, was elected as grand chief of the Assembly of Manitoba Chiefs in October 2022, becoming the first woman to lead the advocacy group in its nearly 35-year history. She was re-elected to the post in July 2024.
In a statement put out by Manitoba Keewatinowi Okimakanak, the organization representing northern Manitoba First Nations, Pimicikamak Cree Nation Chief David Monias called Merrick a guiding light not just for her family, but for people in First Nations communities across Manitoba.
She did not just lead, she inspired, nurtured, and uplifted everyone around her. It was my honour to nominate her for grand chief — a role in which she made a profound difference, She was my leader and I will deeply miss her leadership, her courage, and her guidance. -Pimicikamak Cree Nation Chief David Monias
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Mona Eltahawy is a feminist author, commentator and disruptor of patriarchy. She is editing an anthology on menopause called Bloody Hell! And Other Stories: Adventures in Menopause from Across the Personal and Political Spectrum. Her first book Headscarves and Hymens: Why the Middle East Needs a Sexual Revolution (2015) targeted patriarchy in the Middle East and North Africa and her second The Seven Necessary Sins For Women and Girls (2019) took her disruption worldwide. It is now available in Ireland and the UK. Her commentary has appeared in media around the world and she makes video essays and writes a newsletter as FEMINIST GIANT.
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