Violence against woman

Women continue to suffer domestic violence. PHOTO/NET 

What you need to know:

  • The way violence is meted out to women is puzzling.

The month of April 2021 witnessed a horrible incident that shed even more light on violence against women, and how little the screams of a woman can even tickle men who will not bother coming to her aid, until, it is too late.

The incident is about a young Kuwaiti woman, who was harassed by a young man in the military, and who stalked and asked her to start a relationship. Since the young woman was married with a child, she declined his advances and told him off on several occasions. However,  the man was not having any of that and kept insisting . 

After several attempts of  harassment and beating her up and even an incident of kidnapping, the young woman filed a complaint against him at a police station to keep him away from her. He was apprehended and remanded, but soon he was released on bail. The victim’s sister who is a lawyer pleaded with authorities not to let him out until the day of producing  him in court, their pleas went in vain. 

On the fatal day the young woman was driving her with her daughter and niece in the back seat while her sister was in another car. Somehow, the young man showed up on the same road and hit the sister’s car to stop her from movement he then jumped into the young woman’s car and sped off with her. It seems he threatened her again to drop all charges against him. No one knows what happened next, except that a bit later she was dumped in front of a hospital, stabbed in the chest lying in a pool of blood. The frightened children were still in the back seat of the car and, she succumbed to the  injuries. 

In another video, the sister was seen  wailing and screaming the name of the prosecutor who failed to protect her sister.  In the news and on social media fora,  started a storm of anger and condemnation of such a gruesome crime. It was not just the crime, but how the pleading of these women fell on deaf ears.

In Turkey president Erdogan issued a decree annulling turkey’s ratification of the Istanbul Convention on violence against women. This is a treaty covering domestic violence and seeking to end legal impunity for perpetrators. We are not sure why the president who once praised this treaty, has now changed his mind, but we are sure that the door of violence and “ femicide” against women is once more wide open.

During one of my visits to Turkey, we stayed with relatives in a local neighbourhood, it was then that I witnessed the beating and violence. This included dragging by hair in the middle of the street in broad daylight, and no one interfered, just like a horror film, but in real life!