09/06/2020
COVID-19 FUELED DOMESTIC VIOLENCE AND FATALITY
Domestic Violence is caused by among others the following: the need to control and dominate the others, low self-esteem, extreme jealousy, difficulties in regulating anger and emotions, undiagnosed personality disorder and LACK or INADEQUACY
International conference on the Great lakes region has this to not “In Africa and in the Great Lakes Region, we are still gathering data, but tentative reports on SGBV are equally worrying. In Uganda for example, it is clear that there has been more cases of domestic violence since lockdown than we have had for corona virus. In fact,Uganda has registered several deaths due to domestic violence and no death from COVID-19”.
In my outline of the causes, i made one cause LACK and INADEQUACY distinctive because I strongly believe; it is the main cause of domestic violence against children, women and men in families in Uganda just is making headlines for all media houses taking lives more than Corona. Just to site a few examples, because of the deficient stimulated by COVID-19 in Uganda;
A man committed su***de because the wife was asking for salt costing shs. 2,000 at most which is less than $1 that he could not afford,
A woman locked her children in the house together with her and before them she hanged herself because she could not afford a meal for them,
In the very period a woman in Mukono abandoned her child at a hospital because she was pregnant and could not afford taking care of a two year old at the same time,
Another woman in Mubende slaughtered her own child over shs. 500 the boy had misused yet it was meant for a whole family.
These examples and the like are just so many to an extent that those that have been reported to police and captured by the media are just a tip of an iceberg that is about to wreck a titanic.
It has been scientifically approved that behaviour from growing up in a household where domestic violence was accepted as normal in that family contributes greatly to the violent behaviour of people. Studies further suggest that violent behaviour often is caused by an interaction of situational and individual factors. That means that abusers learn violent behaviour from their family, people in their community as they grow up but also from experience acquired as they are being victimised. They may have seen violence often or they may have been victims themselves thus many abusers admit having been abused as a children.
Children who witness and are actual victims of violence may believe that violence is a reasonable way to resolve their unsmooth relations with people. Girls who witness and experience domestic violence in their families are likely to be victimized by their own husbands and some may develop life forbear for marriage and family life, hence being denied meaningful adult life.
Friend who is reading this, it is my responsibility and yours as well to help reduce domestic violence by providing a family with a basic need. As noted above, the causes of those incidents noted are just very petty needs to many of us yet they look problems to others.
COVID-19 is on a high and stable rise in Uganda meaning that the cases of such violence are steadily increasing and probably may be worse if the provision of necessities in the underprivileged families is NOT addressed.
I therefore beseech and call upon you to partner with us as we reach families with basic needs to save lives and have better people for tomorrow society. Together let us fight the worst enemy disguising as COVID-19 yet the two are totally different with distinctive fatality rate according to Uganda standards.
