Dear Editor,
We are dismayed and concerned by the Spotlight Initiative advertisement in the press on Sunday March 15 for a consultancy for the assessment and development of policy options on restorative justice (specifically for domestic violence) and for support for the implementation of the practice in Guyana.
On 13 February 2020, Help & Shelter and Red Thread were invited to a meeting at the UN Resident Coordinator’s office to discuss the concerns we had a documented about the Spotlight Guyana Initiative. The meeting was cordial and we left with the assurance that the concerns raised were acknowledged and heard, and would be shared among the other UN Agencies in Guyana responsible for the implementation of the project. Assurances were also given that Spotlight Guyana had processes in place for civil society oversight of this initiative through the Civil Society Reference Group, which at the time was open for nominations. The advertisement in the press indicates that either concerns raised were not shared or that they were dismissed
Help & Shelter and Red Thread, together with many other NGOs and CSOs, attended a number of ‘consultations,’ out of which the Final Spotlight Guyana Initiative Project document arose. In none of the meetings we attended – and we have consulted with other NGO representatives who are similarly unaware – was the issue of restorative justice proposed or discussed in any meaningful way. As such, we ask that the UN bodies, and in particular UNICEF, share the context in which restorative justice was proposed and discussed.
Spotlight Initiative Guyana “will address the root causes of violence against women and girls (VAWG) with an emphasis on prevention. It will introduce and expand on preventive measures, address legislative and policy gaps, improve institutional capacities, augment service delivery systems especially in remote communities, enhance data collection and use, and build a stronger civil society response to ensure justice is delivered to women and girls experiencing multiple forms of discrimination and violence.”
Help & Shelter and Red Thread have worked continuously over the past 25+ years with victims and survivors of domestic violence and children traumatized through exposure to domestic violence directly and indirectly. They have worked with communities, schools, service providers, the police, health professionals, social workers, teachers and students across all the regions of Guyana on prevention of, protection from and responses to domestic violence, and have offered free face-to-face and court support counselling and shelter services to thousands of survivors of domestic violence.
Help & Shelter and Red Thread have been integral to the development of Guyana’s National Domestic Violence Policy (NDVP), served on the Oversight Committee for the Implementation of the NVDP, and are the present NGO representatives on the recently reconvened Task Force for the Prevention of Sexual Violence. They were in the forefront of getting the Domestic Violence Act and the Sexual Offences Act enacted and fully implemented and have been in the forefront of advocacy campaigns and other initiatives in defense and support of the fundamental right of women and girls to live lives free from all forms of sexual and gender- based violence and the fear of such violence.
It is our view, based on their expertise and substantial working knowledge, that the use of restorative justice in domestic violence settings in Guyana will put the safety and well-being of survivors at serious risk, lead to re-traumatization of survivors and will ignore the power dynamic of domestic violence that entraps victims and survivors in a cycle of abuse, at the core of which is the exertion of power and control by one partner (the abuser) over the other partner (the victim/survivor). through the use of physical, sexual, psychological and economic abuse. “Historically, RJ is an alternative to repressive criminal sanctions, allowing the parties involved to participate in the solution of the conflict, and giving the conflict back to them” (Christie. (1997). Restorative Justice reviewed in 2019 by Legal Guidance cps.gov.uk “ is a process through which parties with a stake in a specific offence collectively resolve how to deal with the aftermath of the offence and its implications for the future.” We know that RJ is often in juvenile justice cases and we support this wholly but not for domestic violence offences. We also note that the consultancy does not require certification, knowledge or working experience of RJ which seems very odd.
Restorative justice uses mediation and negotiation supposedly between two adults on the basis of equality, while the power dynamic of domestic violence is unequal power and control by one person over another, which is how domestic violence occurs and re-occurs. No mediator or mediation process of one or two sessions will change this, especially due to the complexity of domestic violence. Unfortunately, more than likely the survivor will be intimidated by the presence of the abusive partner and the domestic violence violations will be trivialized. In such unequal conditions justice cannot be served.
What is hard to fathom is why it is proposed to introduce restorative justice when it does not appear to have worked successfully in practice for domestic violence. Space does not permit us to go into this further. Evidence referenced in the Spotlight document on the Domestic Violence Act shows that 71% of all applications for protection orders were granted, which is testimony to the success of the Act for survivors of domestic violence, bolstered by education of magistrates and judicial officers on the dynamics of domestic violence and the Act. And while Help & Shelter and Red Thread have advocated for years for revision to the Act to address its deficiencies, it has nevertheless proved its worth. It is hard to understand why a consultancy to address behavioural change such as capacity-building at community and regional levels in counselling, including lay counselling training and delivery and programmes for
perpetrators of domestic violence, including court-sanctioned accredited counselling and behaviour change programmes for both survivors and perpetrators of domestic violence would not be a priority instead of restorative justice and mediation. It would be very mistaken to believe that survivors or perpetrators of domestic violence will take advantage of restorative justice and mediation. All indications and research show that many do not opt to go that route and there is no guarantee that if they do, the perpetrators will abide by any agreements reached. It is well known that it is only after an average of 10-40 acts of physical, sexual, psychological and economic domestic violence experienced by women that reports are made to police and other agencies.
Guyana Women’s Health and Life Experiences Survey (GWHLES) 2018 reveals that over 50% of Guyanese are subjected to some form of domestic violence, mostly intimate partner violence, a much higher rate than the world average of 30%. The high rate of femicides in Guyana continues unabated and shows no indication of slowing down.
The greatest risk of restorative justice is, however, that all the gains made by the women’s movement in Guyana to move gender-based violence including domestic violence out of the private and into the public realm will be reversed and domestic violence will be driven underground and accepted as an issue for the privacy of the home and the partners involved. This will be a fatal blow to gender equality in Guyana and the fundamental right of women and girls to live lives free from violence and the fear of violence.
Yours faithfully
Danuta Radzik & Josephine Whitehead for Help & Shelter
Karen de Souza and Wintress White for Red Thread
Vidyaratha Kissoon
Janice Jackson
