Mary Nnah
Emerge, a 10-chapter book that contains different forms of gender-based violence with each chapter dealing with a form of gender-based violence was recently launched in Lagos with the sole aim to tackle all forms of Sexual and Gender-Based Violence (SGBV) in our society, through various interventions.
Written by Titilayo Ogunbambi, a gender equality advocate and founder of the nongovernmental organisation, Boundless Hands Africa Initiative, Emerge contains stories of victims the author has worked with personally.
At the end of each chapter, she puts strategies and recommendations that can be taken by the community, government and individuals to curb gender-based violence.
While recommending the best way to tackle gender-based violence in Nigerian society, Ogunbambi noted, “In Emerge I have written some strategies and recommendations and the most important one is education and sensitisation. Young people have to be educated on the ills of gender-based violence and how to sense the signs when it is about to come to them. The community have to be sensitised of those harmful practices and belief that keeps endangering girls and women to suffer gender-based violence encounters”,
She explained further that from her experience with people she has spoken with so far, particularly the victims she featured in her book, she has realised that different forms of gender-based violence are a result of different systemic, social and economic factors.
“Some people are as a result of the fact that the religion or the cultural practices like the female genital mutilation that still happens in some communities while some people are as a result of not knowing their rights to demand what they want. So there is no particular thing that causes it but we have several factors in our communities that associate with gender-based violence encounters”, she noted.
Ogunbambi, a passionate community leader with over ten years of experience in programme design and implementation, gender-based violence advocacy, and sexual reproductive health and rights (SRHR), has over the last ten years been creating a society where everyone is free to lead a happy, safe, and violence-free life. “It has been my driving force! This is not only about you or me here today; it is about our children and the decisions we make today to address societal norms and beliefs that continue to endanger their lives.”
“With every encounter written in this book Emerge, my resolve grew stronger, and my focus remained on setting the girl child free from predestined shackles. A decision I am faced with every time I come in contact with a survivor of Violence or abuse.
“Over time, societal judgment has continued to encourage the culture of silence that suppresses survivors’ voices. The question for me today is, will we ever be free from the shadows of abuse and violence? It’s a question that lingers on my mind and should too on yours”, she noted.
