Activists and lawyers in Africa are calling for urgent action to protect women, girls and boys as digital violence surges across the continent.
Digital violence sounds infinitely better than the usual sort...
A massive rise in internet users, coupled with huge numbers of people aged under 30, has fuelled an increase in gendered online violence across the continent, according to experts, by giving perpetrators new tools to control and silence women and girls, and influence boys.
Technology is amazing, isn't it?
A UN Women report in Kenya found that name-calling, blackmail using negative images of women in politics, and other messages were posted online with the aim of spreading fear, and undermining women’s credibility to participate in elections.
Toughen up, sisters!
The African Union Convention on Ending Violence against Women and Girls was introduced in 2024 and includes digital violence, but according to Sibongile Ndashe, executive director of the Initiative for Strategic Litigation in Africa, it is “regressive”.She said: “We’ve spent a lot of time trying to push back on it because we feel that the convention is not doing what it’s supposed to do in terms of setting out rights, required state obligations and providing clarity [around technology-facilitated gender based violence].”
A charity in Africa fails? Surely it ain't so? I wonder how much British taxpayers money went into it...
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