GADA Asks Church Leaders, Others to Intervene in GBV against Youths, Women

Bassey Inyang in Calabar 

The Gender and Development Action (GADA) has asked churches to get involved in addressing Gender Based Violence (GBV) against youths and women.

At a one day interactive forum held at the Venetian Hall, Calabar, Cross River State, stakeholders drawn from the church from the 18 local government areas of the state, women groups, civil society organisations, policy makers and a host of others, deliberated on the importance of addressing gender-based violence from the perspective of the male youths and women.

Addressing the interactive forum with the theme: ‘Male Responsibility for Transformation of Harmful Social Norms that Perpetuate Gender-Based Violence’, Founder of GADA, Ambassador Nkoyo Toyo, said many factors were responsible for the gender-based violence as it relates to the male child and the female in the home and the larger society.

Toyo said, “In times gone by, when I grew up, when I graduated, I got an automatic job in the Ministry of Justice here in Cross River State.

“All the people who graduated with me got jobs so it was easy for me to get married to the kind of person I married because we got jobs, we had things to do, we could envision a life together, and the future.

“Today, our young men don’t have any of that. Those opportunities are all gone….

“And we are beginning to see the fact that more and more young men are unable to meet the aspirations of their life, they are also unable to build proper families, they are unable to plan their future. Everything is done, you know, in an abridged manner, and so we asked ourselves which community of interests can we go to and visit that we can have this conversation with in a formal and organised way that can take back our message, and impute it into society if you did it in the general public.”

Toyo said that the GADA, with support from the Ford Foundation, in this context congregated the interactive forum to ‘Meet , Share and Learn About Gender Based Violence for Male Youths and Women In The Church’.

“If you just called some young men together and talked about it the follow-up will be difficult but we then said the church is organised. The church is a very organised institution, respected, valued by our people.

“One of the things we need to do is to ask the question: how do we make the church visit some of these challenges and begin to address them.

“The second thing we are also finding out is that the family is the last hope of our society. Many of our communities are broken. Many of our states are broken, leadership has lost its value in many ways,” Toyo said.

She urged the church leaders to ensure that their teachings focused on addressing the physical, and emotional well-being of the male youths and young people in general, instead of focusing solely on their spiritual well-being. 

“It’s a call for us to think about the best interests of the society, how the church can help build the family, because mentality comes from the interpretation of religious scriptures. If the church gives us the learning that we need, definitely the family will change.”

Speaking at the forum, the Special Adviser to the Governor on Religious Affairs, Apostle Frank Umoh, said like the scripture said, bring up a child in the way of God and he will never depart from it. 

Umoh said it was obvious the church has a role to play in eradicating social vices in the society.

“I’m most happy that we are concentrating on the male children. Whatever vices we have in society today is being championed by the male children.

“The rapists, the armed robbers, the kidnappers, the yahoo yahoo; more 80 per cent are male, and so if they are being handled in the church through some political teaching it will really help to curtail these vices.

“What GADA is doing here today is highly commendable. We as pastors are going back to various churches to develop a programme for the male children in our various churches. So I am happy that this is happening in our days because the male child is not safe today, and is the armed robber you put out of society tomorrow.

“Church is the bedrock of our society. When we train the children from the children’s section, to the teenage section to the youth section, by the time they are married, they will grow with this teaching.

“And I believe that it is the church that can help the society to be better. So, it’s the vision in the right direction,” Umoh said.

Also speaking, Chairman of the Christian Association of Nigeria (CAN) Cross River State Chapter, Archbishop Richard Eyamba, said “My generation seems to have failed the younger generation, and we need to say we are sorry because we have not put it right. So,  I call on all young people, wake up from your slumber and take responsibility.”

The state CAN chairman who was represented by CAN Chairman Calabar Municipality, Rt. Rev. James Iqwiro, urged young men and women to work through the proper path so they can get it right, and lay solid foundation that can take them through the future. 

He also enjoined parents to foster closer bonds with their children without discrimination or preferences for the male child over the female or vice versa. 

“When a male child is well groomed, the issue of violence will go away.

“Now for instance, if you understand the mechanics of keeping a clean home you will appreciate the woman. If you know how to cook, and not the pains of cooking, you will appreciate the woman. You won’t abuse the woman. But the male child has been given more time to waste his life, and then the pressure is put on the female child, and every failure of the male child is transferred to the female child.

“So, I am here to act to God’s point that the male children should be groomed, and should be groomed with the fear of God now the Bible says “Teach a child, the male child, the female child should be trained in the way when they grew they will never depart,” Iqwiro said.

The chairman of the CAN Youth Cross River State Chapter, Pastor Obi Akika, urged young men and women to be conscious of gender-based violence because both of them are prone to facing such abuses irrespective of their gender.

“Well, it’s a failed society. Failed society in the sense that we grew up not being taught as male children on how to relate. You see, as you are growing up as a man, there are certain things that will say, oh, you are not supposed to go to the kitchen, you are a man. Even in the house, your sister will talk to you and the first thing that will come out from your mum’s voice will be, why are you talking to him like that? Don’t you know he’s a man? And you see all those things.

“And it’s affecting the upbringing of a man negatively because that egocentric aspect will now trickle into the man’s mentality. Ah, you know I’m a man, I’m supposed to behave like this, and so on and so forth. But as a church, there is need. You see, in Christianity, God created them both male and female. You know, we are all equal in the eyes of God. We are all equal,” he said.