A woman is beaten within an inch of her life by her partner and is forced to seek refuge with a friend whose husband then starts to make sexual advances. And all this as one of her sons is taken away by the authorities and the other sells plastic bags on the road to help supplement their income.
And as this woman waits for a broken leg to heal and struggles to find direction in her life, another is also beaten and daily tormented by her reputed husband who does not allow her to leave the home unaccompanied. When she can’t take it any more and has charges instituted against him, she faces the brunt of a slothful justice system which puts her job in jeopardy on account of her frequent court trips.
These are just two of the cases which keep Pastor Patricia Sheerattan-Bisnauth pressing on, as she joins forces with other women rights and development activists to help fight gender-based violence. If all are not involved, she said, then the battle would not be won.
The recently appointed Executive Director of the Guyana Responsible Parenthood Association (GRPA) said that Guyanese need to become “enraged” over the spate of incidents involving gender- based violence which for too long had been treated as a “private matter.” She said that the issue is affecting all sectors of society and for quite some time has been endemic, and only the collective effort of all could stem the onslaught on mainly women and children.
“It is too prevalent; it is endemic, and I think we should be more enraged… I think we have been too tolerant and it is almost like we are immune… It has to speak to our hearts; we need to kind of ignite domestic and sexual violence into a wider level in sections of society,” Sheerattan-Bisnuath told the Sunday Stabroek in a recent interview.
The activist, who has worked with an international agency in Switzerland on advocacy and education in relation to women and gender justice, as well as economic and ecological justice, also decried the growing incidence of rape and the paucity of convictions in court.
She said too that men need to be engaged in a meaningful role as partners to end domestic and sexual violence, although she recognized that the Ministry of Human Services and Social Security does have a men’s affairs bureau which looks at men’s role in ending gender-based violence.
She called for more facilities for women and children that will not only empower women to leave abusive relationships but also provide shelter for them.
Sheerattan-Bisnauth, who said her job as a pastor has exposed her to some horrifying cases of violence, said there should be some accountability on the part of people who are put to address these social issues, as they cannot be blind to them and people need to be cared for.
“We should have a system in our country, in our nation where people have a right to live a life free of violence; people have a right to have all their basic needs met. I am not talking about handouts, but a society which should cater for people to be able to earn an income, where there are facilities for such women, where they can be made whole again and can themselves access some kind of help…” she said.
In terms of women accessing justice, Sheerattan-Bisnauth noted that they experience all kinds of problems, and she said the system is set in such a way that sometimes women cannot access it because it does not consider their situations. She added that the “whole system is too long and drawn [out]…”
Screening
In an effort to help deal frontally with the issue of gender-based violence at the GRPA Sheerattan-Bisnauth announced that there will soon be screening for gender-based violence of all the persons who seek their services.
“We will be checking to see how many persons would have experienced gender-based violence either related to the reason they are visiting or in their lifetime,” she revealed.
The association has a programme under the theme ‘Gender-based violence is everyone’s business’ that addresses the issue, and which sends the message that it is “an issue that has to be tackled by all people in Guyana…”
“People still have it in their minds that it is a private issue that should be dealt with in a kind of secretive way, but I think the media has done a great job in telling these stories, because these are horrible stories; no one is proud of it but they are stories that need to be told and addressed and dealt with. If they are not they remain hidden and they infect the whole society,” she said during the frank interview.
Under the gender-based violence programme there is advocacy, education and awareness, counselling and other support services through the linking of partner organizations. The programme is supported by USAID through its community development services, and it also includes television call-in programmes on Channels 9 and 11 dealing with the subject.
“What we are attempting to do is have more of a practical approach where we deal with this in a more realistic way as it affects people; even on the television whenever we are having a discussion people must find themselves there, they must be relating, we must be engaging… and to kind of open the door so that people can come in and participate in this as much as possible,” she explained.
She pointed out that people are getting tired of workshops, and although they are useful there needs to be other means of engaging people. As a result, she said, they are having “more… engaging conversations for people to have more kind of a public forum and more focus groups.”
According to Sheerattan-Bisnauth there is a need to engage people at the “level of their hearts and heads,” and this can be done by allowing them to do more of the talking and shaping the content, rather than the content being prepared for them. More training for service providers is also being addressed, and they are engaging organizations which are dealing with gender-based violence such as Red Thread and Help & Shelter − both organizations she worked with in the past − and the Ministry of Human Services & Social Security, as the association does not want to duplicate effort.
Critically, according to the association’s new head, they are also strengthening community networks, because one of the problems facing the country is the “disintegration of community and so people are not engaged and involved…” She said service providers and the communities need to react to violence by building up a community support base and this is one of the areas in which she is interested in having the GRPA play a role.
She also wants to engage the private sector and get them involved, since the “violence is linked to a wider level of violence in this society and this violence affects us all. In terms of people who would come and set up businesses it has an effect and an impact, because one of the things that you do in the survey is [ask] what is the environment like for my investment?”
Further, she noted that the issue cannot be compartmentalized and people of every status, ethnic group, class and every field should come out to say no.
Men as partners
Sheerattan-Bisnuath recognized that her now deceased predecessor Fredrick Cox had started a group called Men of Purpose (MOP), and she hopes to build on this and look at men as partners in the work of gender-based violence.
Partnership is lacking in Guyana, she maintained, whether at the level of the highest political offices or in homes, as persons seem always to be in a “combative mood.”
There seems to be dominance built into marriages that at times comes with violence in many forms and this, she said, is what children are learning.
She thought there were very good ways that partnership could be injected into this whole issue, so that the positive side of what men can do is recognized. In revitalizing the MOP initiative, Sheerattan-Bisnauth said that they will be embarking on a transformative process of promoting “positive masculinities and transforming forms of masculinities, which are destructive to women, men, families and society as a whole.” She said the approach is not to demonise men or to instil feelings of guilt and powerlessness, but to peel away the layers of gender construction, which are key to understanding manhood within the Guyanese, cultural, economic, political and social context.
Meantime, she said that the GRPA has great scope in Guyana to play an important role in issues that are critical to society, since it is a leading organisation for sexual and reproductive health and rights. The association has a health clinic and a programme outreach area, but it not only provides health services but support services in terms of counselling and education. The largest portion of the association’s clientele are persons seeking HIV testing, and up to 30 persons a day can visit to access this service, but the facility also undertakes pap smears, breast examination and other services.
It also provides services for men and Sheerattan-Bisnauth said many persons are unaware of this, and importantly men can access testing for prostate cancer at the facility.
She revealed that the association is looking for a full-time doctor, but the new head said she is “shocked” that they have advertised repeatedly and yet no one seems interested. At present the doctor spends three days a week at the association and patients do not pay the full cost of the services provided. Medical termination of pregnancy is also offered, but only the orals are available since they do not have a doctor who is trained and licensed for this service.
“The whole aim is not to promote abortion, no one wants abortion… but to make it accessible to women and girls who cannot afford to pay private fees and who may go and have botched abortions…” she cautioned.
Sheerattan-Bisnauth hopes that by the end of the year that the association would have outreach clinics to at least one of two rural areas.
The association also works with sugar workers and holds forums with them, where they are allowed to express themselves openly and address not only gender-based violence but also substance abuse, and it is hoped that this programme will be expanded. The initiative with the workers came out of an invitation by the Guyana Sugar Corporation (GuySuCo).
Apart from working in Switzerland Sheerattan-Bisnauth, who is the wife of former Education Minister Dr Dale Bisnauth himself a pastor, also worked with Red Thread in the early ’90s and the Social Impact Amelioration Programme (SIMAP). Quite a big part of her career was spent on gender and development and community development, and she was the first coordinator of the Amerindian development programme.
