He assures that teaching women what their rights are “is a threat to those who oppress them”
Stresses that the end of the conflict in the east involves demanding “greater transparency” on the export of minerals
31 Jan. (EUROPA PRESS) –
The activist and lawyer Yvette Mushigo has lamented that the Congolese population has “stopped trust” in the United Nations Mission in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (MONUSCO) because its deployment “has not borne peace” and has lashed out at the inaction of the ‘blue helmets’, who “see people die and do nothing”.
“People ask for MONUSCO to leave because they have the impression that it is of no use to us. The population is attacked near the MONUSCO headquarters and MONUSCO does not intervene. They tell us that it is due to their mandate, but no one understands it”, he explained before asking himself how it is possible that “a mission like this has been in the country for more than twenty years and has not been able to put an end to the violence”.
This was expressed during an interview with Europa Press at the headquarters of the magazine ‘Mundo Negro’, in Madrid, where he clarified that although it is true that on occasions the mission “has helped the DRC Army to train”, the Congolese “have stopped trusting” their work.
In this sense, he has reported that demonstrations are taking place in the vicinity of the barracks and has criticized the words of the UN Secretary General, António Guterres, who has warned that the M23 rebels “are even more armed than the Congolese Army and the MONUSCO”. “His presence is no longer understood,” he added.
Mushigo, who has received the Mundo Negro Fraternity 2022 award and coordinates the network of organizations Synergie des Femmes pour la Paix et la Réconciliation (SPR), which brings together more than 40 associations for the defense of Human Rights in the DRC, Burundi and Rwanda, has pointed out that the Congolese are “tired of the cycles of violence”.
That is why he has stressed the importance of international aid to the countries of the region “be conditioned to demands regarding the establishment of peace” in the area. “Any development project that is carried out must be conditioned by the idea of really seeking peace. There have been many peace agreements, but when it comes to putting them into practice this entails problems. Sometimes the sovereignty of the States is not even respected “, he asserted.
On sending aid to the region, he recalled that the European Union has recently provided an assistance package to Rwanda “just when the country is collaborating in attacks against the DRC.” “This causes a lot of skepticism among the population. The aid must be subject to a series of conditions”, he has maintained before stating that it is necessary to “demand results”.
In relation to the conflict in the eastern DRC, a country where 70 percent of the population lives below the poverty line despite being one of the richest on the African continent in terms of mineral resources, he stressed that it is of an “economic war related to the extraction of minerals and other products”.
“These minerals are exported illegally and enter the international market. Why not demand more transparency about the origin of these minerals? How is it possible for a country that does not produce them to be the largest exporter in the world?” regarding the role of Rwanda. “We must demand greater transparency because that would facilitate the end of the conflict,” he continued.
However, he has stressed that Rwanda “is not an enemy” for the Congolese and has called for “distinguishing between political and social issues in order to live in cohesion”. Although he has admitted that at the political level “it is a problem that has implications for coexistence”, he has warned of the prevalence of “political manipulation, which has nothing to do with reality” on the ground.
HUMAN RIGHTS OF WOMEN
In the DRC, violence against women has been instrumentalized. According to data from Doctors Without Borders, in the eastern part of the country, 75 percent of women between the ages of 15 and 49 have declared having suffered physical or sexual violence from their partner. For Mushigo, this makes it vitally important to “teach women what their rights are”, something that becomes “a threat to those who oppress them”.
“The woman is considered a fragile being that has to be protected. This also constitutes a fragility for the man within a patriarchal system. In our context, the man has to protect the woman, it is a reaffirmation of his masculinity the fact that that is capable of protecting it”, he underlined.
In this context, he stressed that “when a woman is attacked or raped, the man feels touched, humiliated”, while if a woman is forced to move, this fragility extends “to the entire community”.
That is why she has claimed the need for women to “know their rights” despite the fact that this can be seen “as a provocation” for those who oppress them. “Knowledge of rights gives women power and dilutes the power of those who exercise violence against them, it is a threat to those who want them to be dependent. When women discover their rights, this balance is broken and there are people who feel threatened,” he reaffirmed.
Regarding the laws in force in the DRC, he has declared that the Family Code was reformed in 2015 precisely so that the woman does not have to ask permission to sign work contracts or travel whenever her husband does. “Now there is talk of a greater interest in the home,” she pointed out.
In this sense, he recalled that there is a law that requires that 50 percent of positions in public institutions be held by women, something that “has never been fulfilled.” “There are difficulties in putting these laws into practice,” she has said.
CYCLIC VIOLENCE
Mushigo has spoken, in turn, of the “eternal restart” that the African country is experiencing in terms of abuse and violence. “Every day you hear that there have been new attacks and there are new displaced people. (…) People are starting to get tired of reliving things that already happened in the past. All this has consequences and there are fewer and fewer humanitarian organizations working in the area,” he warned.
Thus, he wanted to emphasize that the number of displaced persons “continues to increase” and has lamented the consequences. “Before there were more humanitarian organizations, but now they have closed their offices and have left. This is not encouraging. It is a serious problem for all the people who already live in very difficult conditions and who now seem to have less support than before “, he highlighted.
In relation to this, he has emphasized that the media have portrayed the eastern part of the DRC as “a dangerous zone, a red zone in which it is difficult to work”. “They forget that in these areas there are people who need help, who are doing a job,” denounced Mushigo, who has insisted that much of the information disseminated “is not based on the reality that is experienced on the ground.”
“It is important that the information is true because there is a lot of misinformation. (…) There is no clear strategy to intervene fairly because there is no coherence between the information that is available and reality,” he has settled.
