15 Nov 2020

Botswana Public Employees Union (BOPEU) second deputy president, Ms Patricia Raditladi, says the union is committed to empowerment of women and youth.

Ms Raditladi made the remarks at a BOPEU women empowerment seminar in Maun on November 13.

She said BOPEU constitution advocated for equal rights.

On gender based violence (GBV), Ms Raditladi said everyone had a right to live a life free from violence.

She said the workshop aimed at empowering youth and women in leadership positions in the union.

Maun-based lawyer, Mr Lawrence Lecha of Lecha and Associates challenged women to report issues of abuse instead of protecting perpetrators.

He said Batswana had a culture of concealing issues of GBV. 

He observed that statistics showed that most cases of GBV in the country were perpetuated by men against women.

“Statistics show that about 67 per cent of women have been subjected to some form of abuse in Botswana as compared to 32 per cent of women in the world,” Mr Lecha said.

For his part, Detective Constable Keiphe Letsogile of Maun police said GBV cases were a concern in the village.

She said about seven murder cases had been recorded in Maun this year as well as 54 cases of rape and 42 cases of defilement.

Constable Letsogile said some cases of defilement were not reported and only identified when girls gave birth at the hospital. She said there had been 13 cases of threat to kill registered to date and 42 cases of assault occasioning bodily harm.

She pointed out that men were perpetrators in most cases.

Detective Constable Okabo Gaopelo, also of Maun police, raised concern about women who failed to report GBV cases from an initial stage.

Constable Gaopelo said what started as assault often ended up growing resulting in murder or sexual abuse.

He also said women should not hope that abusive men would change because instead matters ended being the worst cases of GBV. Ends