Wednesday,19th.June.2024. Sighing, Seeking, Singing
Written by Obwoge Joseph on June 19, 2024
In the Tsavo National Park, there lives an aquatic hole where creatures of all colours, shapes and sizes arrive during the day and the night quenching their insatiable thirst; lapping up the universal solvent and frolicking in the calm, cool, composed, collected, serene and tranquil mud; all done at the same time fairly and squarely in an apple pie orderliness.
When the power of love vanquishes over the love of power; undeniably the whole world shall be dawned into peace. MashAllah!
The Black Agravi and the White Aragvi are two rivers of Georgia that thanks to their composition, density, elevation and temperature that develop between them; act as a razor-thin bulwark preventing them from mixing. Never did it dawn upon coffee that she was dulcet and exquisite, sumptuous and finger-licking until she made a concord with the: hot steaming off the grill water, milk, sugar and the cooking vessels in the presence of the refinery fire.
Variety sweetens life.
SubhanaAllah!
The African Parliamentary Union, Equileap, United Nations Children’s Fund and the United Nations Women’s Report indicate that appallingly:
40% of female Members of Parliament have been brazenly sexually harassed at work.
Over 140 million girls have undergone the excruciating pangs of Female Genital Mutilation.
Over 130 million child brides reside in Africa; over 22 million of the child brides are in Nigeria.
One in 37 ladies on African soil dies during pregnancy and childbirth compared to one in 7,800 in Australia.
Over 240 million girls and women in Sub-Saharan Africa women are crippled by the manacles of abject pins and needles.
One in ten ladies partially misses class and when the push comes to shovel, regrettably she entirely drops out of school thanks to a dearth of sanitary towels.
65% of ladies in Kenya suffer from the lack of access to sanitary pads.
The accumulative wealth of the 22 most affluent men under the sun is more than the wealth of all women on African soil.
40 billion hours are spent annually in Africa by girls and women in the scorching and sweltering summer’s heat in pursuit of water.
Girls and women in rural Malawi spend over three times time more than boys and men in fetching firewood and water.
Only 24% of women are represented in Africa’s Legislative Assemblies.
Only one African country has 50% plus of women’s representation in its Parliament. It is Rwanda.
Others that have obliterated the glass ceiling like Rwanda are Cuba, Mexico, Nicaragua and the United Arabs’ Emirates.
In In Mali, there were death threats directed to humanitarian workers hunting and gathering data.
The eminent sculptor German Pastor and Theologian Martin Niemoller(1892-1984) gleefully embraced and rallied behind the ideologies executed by the German tyrant Adolf Hitler; myopically and in a raw-baked manner thinking that he was an exception; he was the cut above the rest, he thought. Ecstatically and exuberantly did he celebrate the gassing and the vaporisation in the concentration camps.
Regrettably, it later dawned on him that he was also a conferred and qualified candidate for those draconian, dud and umami subjection.
He changed and at the dropping of a hat manner embarked on advocating for humans’ rights and openly as pique went against the autocrat German Adolf Hitler’s grains.
Painfully he penned this poem:
First and foremost they came for the Socialist; however, I did not speak out because I was not a Socialist.
Secondly: they came for the Trade Unionists; however I did not speak out because I was not a Trade Unionist.
Thirdly: they came for the Jews; however I did not speak out because I was not a Jew.
Fourthly, lastly certainly not least: they came for me and regrettably there was no one to speak out for me.
In the annals of conflicts, therein lurks clandestinely a chapter rife in the most jet blackest, darkest and gloomiest despair-stained rivulet courtesy of the umami acts.
From the genocidal campaigns in Bosnia; to the war-torn Gaza Strip and the civil war-punctured Democratic Republic of Congo in Africa; undeniably this insidious widget has wielded mangle-wrecking aftertastes to the innocent victims.
They have left wallowing in quagmires and individuals punctuated with fractured communities.
As the profuse cosmic endeavours intensify every crack of the dawn to address the thorn in the flesh; the sojourning towards accountability and belaying them stand a testament to the clarion call to action featuring:
sacrifices,
savings,
security,
services,
solidarity,
stretches and
sufferings.
This is tailored to enable the safe and sound as a Fort Knox earth for all and sundry.
From the battlefields of Syria to the prodigious hamlets of South Sudan, this heinous weapon of mental, physical, social and spiritual wars eggs on ravaging communities and destroying the very fabric of societies.
The globetrotting geared towards expunging it hook, line and sinker remains fraught in hot potatoes, labyrinth and rigmarole that demand urgent affection, affirmation, attention and love.
It is a muted and ravenous dragon that grapples nations even after brazenly subjecting peace treaties to the authority and power vested in the indelible ink and papers in the annals of history.
This sinister reality scars survivors and victims perpetuating recurring cycles of trauma.
Children, men and women innocently graduate into candidates and are ripe targets of unimaginable abuses.
Their bodies, dignity, hearts, souls and spirits become Guinea pigs’ battlegrounds for domination, power and self-gratification.
Welcome to The Cosmic Elimination Of Sexual Violence In Conflicts.
There are 19 countries where the most conflicts-related sexual violence occurs and they include:
Afghanistan,
Central African Republic,
Iraq,
Liberia,
Nigeria,
Somalia and
South Sudan
Abortion, enforced sterilisation, forced marriage, forced pata pata,forced pregnancy, rape, sexual slavery and trafficking are forms of sexual violence as defined by the United Nations.
On the 19th.In June.2015, the United Nations General Assembly proclaimed that every 19th. June annually: the world shall be commemorating The Global Day For The Elimination Of Sexual Violence In Conflicts.
The Resolution was accepted and adopted by the United Nations Security Council Resolution.
Statistics on children, men and women crippled by the manacles of sexual violence are missing as victims fear speaking out capered with archaic, rigid and detrimental set norms and deeply cherished, etched and embedded customs.
Buildher, Dalberg, International Development Research Centre (IDRC) and the Kenya National Bureau Of Statistics Economic Survey 2023 and 2024 report that:
Kshs. 15.8 million only have been disbursed to 48 groups by the Women’s Enterprises Funds towards the construction sector in the 2022/2023 Financial Year.
Globally: only 13% of all construction companies are owned by women.
10.8% and 14.7% of construction workers are women in the USA and the United Kingdom respectively.
20% of the construction workforce in Africa consists of women.
Skilled female architects, construction managers, engineers, real estate managers and urban developers and planners are fewer than 11% in the African soil.
3.9% of women report cases of sexual harassment to authorities.
10% of construction sites do not supply toilet papers.
94% of women in the construction industry are sexually harassed.
Only 3% of construction workers are women.
In 2023, out of 236,000 workers in the construction sector; only 40,600 were women.
7.3% of registered engineers and 17% of quantity surveyors are women.
In 2019, only three in 20 contractors were females.
80% of women in construction are unskilled.
Powerful, willing and able legal frameworks catalyse the effective obliterating of the sexual violence in conflicts.
Sapientia Divitia Est: knowledge is power.
Equity education to all eliminates sexual violence in conflicts.
Deliberate willingness and ability to do away with archaic, destructive and perils fraught, egregious and infractious ideologies.
Accepting that all are equal is a prerequisite to the elimination of sexual violence in conflicts.
Respect is what we owe each other; love is what we sufficiently, philanthropically and unreservedly share.
Global civic education is paramount to expunge sexual violence in conflicts.
Let us unite and never allow foreign allies to disintegrate us.
Employment should be hinged on meritocracy.
Ours is a world of nuclear giants and ethnocentric ethnical infants.
We know more about war than we know about peace.
We know more about killing than we know about healing.
We know more about disintegration than we know about accommodation, co-existence, getting along and integrating.
We have grasped the mystery of the atom and rejected The Sermon On The Mountain.
“Prejudice is a burden that confuses the past; threatens the future and renders the present inaccessible,” the gilt edged Poet Maya Angelou.
“We are all interwoven into that gargantuan web of humanity and the ALMIGHTY LORD GOD holds me and you accountable and responsible for the influence that we exert on each other,” the pulchritudinous Blue Stocking and Trailblazer Ellen Gould Harmon White.
One of the most greatest fighters in the Islamic faith is Khawla Bint Alazwar(R.A).
She is the woman.
The greatest Islamic erudite and stalwart is Aisha(R.A).
She is the woman.
The most greatest who loved passionately Prophet Muhammad (PBUH) is Fatimah(R.A).
She is the woman.
The most greatest who sacrificed the lion’s share in a single day in the Islamic faith is Khansaa(R.A).
She is the woman.
The first martyr in the Islamic faith is Sumayya(R.A).
She is the woman.
The first subscriber to the Islamic faith is Khadijah(R.A).
She is the woman.
Proficient in entrepreneurship is she.
She is Khadijah (R.A).
She is the woman.
In the Islamic historical annals, one of the most gnarly teachers is Aisha(R.A).
She is the woman.
The longest in the tooth (the oldest) university under the sun globally is the University of Qarawiyyin domiciled in Morocco in Africa.
Factually speaking: it was masterminded by Fatima Al Fihriyya.
She is the woman.
The Member Of The Fourth Estate Mariam Muthoni Binti Abdulghani advises me and thee that,”Thamani ya mja si taji ola ndimi pamwe nacho kinywa.”Selah!
Genesis 1:31; Proverbs 31:10-31; 1st.Peter 3:7 and Revelation 21:3,4,22 and 23.
Adversity Intelligence (AQ), Cultural Intelligence (CQ), Emotional Intelligence (EQ), Intelligence Quotient (IQ) and Social Intelligence (SQ) should be integrated and practised by me and you.
What sauce is good for the goose is also good for the gander.
The victims of sexual violence in conflicts are in the valley.
The victims of sexual violence in conflicts are at the tower.
Once we elevate them, they shall be at the mountaintop.
The victims of sexual violence are wondering and wrestling.
The victims of sexual violence are waiting and watching.
Once we elevate them, they shall be witnessing and worshipping.
The victims of sexual violence are sighing.
The victims of sexual violence are seeking.
Once we elevate the victims of sexual violence; undeniably they shall be singing.
By Professor and Philosopher Daniel Masese.