By Ultimatenewsnigeria
Traditional rulers of Izzi clan have promised to help curb violence against women and girl children in Ebonyi State.
The Monarchs made the pledge at a one day advocacy Dialogue with the Traditional leaders, aimed at seeking their support for the elimination of all forms of Violence Against Children, Women and Girls(VAWG) in Abakaliki local government area of Ebonyi state organized by National Orientation Agency with support from EU/ UN spotlight initiative.
They traditional rulers who admitted that there were aspect of their culture that were against women and girls promised to put in place laws that would protect women and girl children.
The traditional rulers who shared some horrible experiences being faced by women in rural communities called for by-laws on gender based violence in the school curriculum,to help curb violence against women and girl children.
One of the traditional leaders HRH Eze Mathew Ukpa of Okpitumo community told a story of a mother of four children who the husband beat frequently and chased out with the children from his community and how she with the help of an NGO (Child protection agency) brought the man to sanity with some conditions.
Also speaking, Mr Uzoigwe Chukwuma Traditional redcap Chief of Ida community said, "I am a teacher. Gender based violence should be taught in schools, it should form part of the school curriculum to help the girls to know what it is all about and their rights.
Also HRH Eze Pius N. O Ngele of Ndiegu Okpitumo community, noted, "this thing we are saying is very much in Izzi land, as I am here now if I die none of my daughters will be allowed inherit any of my property, our law does not allow that and it is very bad and very difficult these days. And my community Secretary was saying here that we made by-laws, yes it is true. I'm suggesting that if such law can be done in local government level it will help more. Because immediately we used that our bylaw in the community and insist that this is what we want to do now because we have grown to the generation that have seen that what we were doing is not good, the people ran to our cultural leaders Amegu while they know that what they are doing is very bad to the age we are now.
"If you go to the old generation of Izzi land, any woman that gives birth to only female children has nothing to inherit from the husbands wealth, even the husband will abandon her and marry another woman immediately no matter how industrious or hardworking the woman maybe, he will overlook the woman as if he is not the father of the girls. Such bylaw will help".
HRH Fidelis Nwonumara Nodo 11 of Amagu community Abakaliki, though agreed with what others said but noted how difficult it would be for the custodians of cultures to abolish some of the cultures.
He said, "nobody is violating the right of a woman or girl child, in our tradition, nobody gives inheritance to a woman or girl. There is no way you will give landed property to your girl child who is married to another place, it will bring big problems to our place.
"For instance, I have twenty female children and they are married to different places, will they come from there husband places to inherit landed property here, Amegu people said it is not done, that it is a taboo in Izii culture. What we do is that if a woman does not have a male child, if the husband dies, a family member from the husband side will take over the woman and the property of the man, and he will now know how to take care of the family of the late brother.
"We do not maltreat female child or woman, no body will throw away his child because is a female, it's just that our tradition does not accept giving landed property to the woman".
The EU-UN spotlight Initiative Coordinator in charge of Cross River and Ebonyi state, Mr Emmanuel Oloruntoba in his speech noted that reason for the advocacy dialogue was to seek support of the Traditional leaders to eliminate all forms of violence against women and girls.
" This visit is to seek support of Traditional leaders to end all forms of VAWG as they are the linkage and most important in the communities to achieve this. We want your collaboration, want you to take over the program so that even when we are through in the state you will take it up as custodians of cultures in your communities".
Also speaking, the Director of National Orientation Agency, Ebonyi State, Dr Emma Abba solicited the support of the traditional rulers in the elimination of violence against women and girls.
He called on the traditional rulers to use of their cultural practices to enhance development in their communities.
"As the custodian of culture and tradition, you should use your cultural practices and tradition to enhance development to make people happy. The well being of the people is very important, they should stop all those harmful traditional practices should be dropped but the ones that are good they should promote it. For example, beating of women, rape and forced marriage, maltreatment to widows are all harmful practices that should be stopped in the communities".
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