We sup­port the Prime Min­is­ter's re­solve to ad­dress the state of crime, as stat­ed in her con­tri­bu­tion to the de­bate on the De­fence Amend­ment Bill. How­ev­er, we in­sist that the adop­tion by Cab­i­net of the Na­tion­al Gen­der Pol­i­cy, and the im­ple­men­ta­tion of the pol­i­cy mea­sures there­in, is a crit­i­cal mea­sure which must be im­me­di­ate­ly im­ple­ment­ed to stop the tears of women and girls.

We are not yet con­vinced that an es­ca­la­tion of a mil­i­tary so­lu­tion is the an­swer to gen­der-based vi­o­lence. We recog­nise that vi­o­lence is learned be­hav­iour and un­til we ad­dress the root so­cial caus­es we will on­ly in­crease the num­ber of peo­ple be­ing ar­rest­ed. More po­lice, more sol­diers, more jails.

The prin­ci­ples of so­cial jus­tice, so elo­quent­ly de­scribed by Pres­i­dent Car­mona, need to be a ma­jor flank of the de­fence. There is no bet­ter way to pave the way for a strength­ened de­fence against "in­ter­nal hos­tile crim­i­nal el­e­ments" and pro­tect­ing women and girls than through an ap­proved Na­tion­al Gen­der Pol­i­cy. The im­ple­men­ta­tion of the pol­i­cy mea­sures is what will, in the short and long term, stop an­guish and dis­tress ex­pe­ri­enced by women and ben­e­fit the en­tire so­ci­ety.

The 2012 Draft Gen­der Pol­i­cy, which has been be­fore Cab­i­net for ap­proval since Ju­ly, seeks to have an ex­pand­ed, co-or­di­nat­ed, na­tion­al ap­proach to en­sur­ing that both men and women are grant­ed the best con­di­tions un­der which they may de­vel­op their po­ten­tial as hu­man be­ings and cit­i­zens and en­joy their fun­da­men­tal hu­man rights and free­doms in­clud­ing those of safe­ty and se­cu­ri­ty.

The pol­i­cy ob­jec­tive in re­la­tion to gen­der-based vi­o­lence is "to de­vel­op and im­ple­ment in­te­grat­ed mea­sures to pre­vent, treat and al­le­vi­ate the in­ci­dence of gen­der-based vi­o­lence, in­crease women's and men's un­der­stand­ing of their le­gal rights and re­spon­si­bil­i­ties, and im­prove reme­dies for re­dress."The ques­tions to be an­swered in re­la­tion to the De­fence Amend­ment Bill are:

How ef­fec­tive will it be in "pre­vent­ing, treat­ing and al­le­vi­at­ing the in­ci­dence of gen­der-based vi­o­lence and crimes im­pact­ing women, in the short or long run? How will we mea­sure its ef­fec­tive­ness? Can more laws, more ar­rests, be the on­ly an­swer? And ar­rest of whom?

We call on Cab­i­net to en­sure the pro­tec­tion of all through the im­me­di­ate im­ple­men­ta­tion of the 2012 Draft Na­tion­al Gen­der Pol­i­cy which has had the ben­e­fit of decades of ex­ten­sive pub­lic con­sul­ta­tion.

Hazel Brown

Net­work of NGOs for the Ad­vance­ment of Women