The Nkumba University based United faith evangelical Ministries International-UFEM together with it’s U.S partners, Heather Hally Foundation yesterday lauched the Purple power-Uganda at Flight Motel Entebbe.
In their theme, ‘Breaking chains- crossing boarders’ the Purple power attracted close to 50 participants including police officers, pastors, domestic violence victims within Wakiso and Nkumba University students.
According to Pastor Deo, the UFEMI-Uganda over seer, the event will be held annually as a fundraiser for the sustainence of domestic violence victims adding that, “We are launching this today but we plan to have it on our calenders as our annual event. Currently, 15 ladies are able to smile because of generous donations from our partners“.
One of the event panelists, Sharif Ssebina a law student at Nkumba University, said that if one finds him or her self in a demostic violence related assault, start with police, “but if you fail to get help from police, you have the liberty to go straight to court, court can issue a restraint order against your tormentor. It is both the matter of court and police, police has a key role in investigating the circumstances related to the act of domestic violence and therefore, should never be over looked,” he advised.
“In Entebbe, we are experiencing many domestic violence related cases, we have been able to integrate victims by engaging counselors for psycho-social counseling, in some instances, we have been able to even re-unite families,” said Atai Sarah, police officers incharge of Family and child protection unit, Entebbe police station.
Addressing participants at the Purple power event, the event sponsor Dr. Lynette Sharpe said that, “Masculinity stereotypes like men are strong and aggressive by nature, have given men a sense of entitlement, those are the ancient kind of mindset that we are trying to diminify, female gender roles have over the years been streamlined to soft work, this too makes men feel superior , she revealed.
Dr. Lynette further showed gratitude that Nkumba University students had embraced her call and heed to the need for domestic violence awareness, “I am glad that we have young people from the university here, it is a top notch opportunity to engage them at an early age, we need to put it categorically clear to them that domestic violence is real, each one of us has a role to play in this fight,” she asserted.
The 2021 Police Annual crime report indicates that a total of 17,533 cases of Domestic Violence were reported to Police compared to 17,664 reported in 2020, showing a 0.74% decrease.
Domestic violence was mainly caused by dispute over family property, Failure to provide for the family, Drug and alcohol abuse, and Cases of infidelity.
By the end of 2021, 1,640 cases had been taken to Court, out of which, 464 cases secured convictions, 14 cases were acquitted, 105 cases were dismissed while 1,027 cases were still pending in Court whereas 6,177 cases were still under inquiry.
A total of 17,553 people were victims of Domestic Violence of whom