Jesuits Refugee Service (JRS), an international refugee entity of the Society of Jesus (Jesuits), has reached out to internally displaced women and girls in Cameroon’s Southern region, empowering them with leadership skills.
In a Tuesday, April 25 report, JRS officials say that the camp dubbed “Girls Leading Our World (GLOW)” that also sought to have the beneficiaries know their role in society aimed at reinforcing JRS’s response to the “protection needs of internally displaced women and girls.”
“To reinforce its humanitarian response to the protection needs of internally displaced women and girls in the region, JRS West Africa organized the GLOW camp,” JRS officials say about the initiative that the government of Basque and Alboan, a Spanish-based organization, funded.
In the report, JRS Field Agent in the region says that 40 girls aged between 12 and 25 years old attended the camp, which took 10 days and that they shared their experiences besides enjoying “a safe and healing space together.”
“We decided to hold the camp in Kribi, a coastal area in southern Cameroon because it was a neutral space for them, where they were able to speak freely about complex issues,” Kongmo Kingsley is quoted as saying.
During these camp days, Ms. Kingsley says that “the girls worked together on topics such as sexual education, self-esteem, human rights, interpersonal communication, and conflict resolution.”
She adds that the main objective of the camp “was to emphasize the significant role that girls have in society, promote leadership, and provide the skills needed to work on reducing gender-based violence (GBV).”
Through the Camp, Ms. Kingsley says that JRS also supported Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs) from the urban areas of Yaoundé and Douala fleeing from “the socio-political conflict in the northwest and southwest regions of the country.”
She says that the conflict that dates back to 2017 “has forced thousands of people to flee”, the majority being women while many more are IDPs.
“The women we serve arrive in Yaoundé with traumas due to rape, murder, and insecurity. They come here hoping to find safety for themselves and their families,” the JRS Field Agent says.
She further says that she finds it regrettable that the women are still “exposed to stigma, abuse, and domestic violence” on arrival at the place they expect to get help.
The JRS expert in Mental Health and Psychosocial Support (MHPSS), Christian Alama, is quoted as saying, “For internally displaced women in Cameroon, dreaming is difficult in a society that doesn’t allow them to do so. Helping them to dream was a wonderful experience.”
“We worked with them to build their capacity to cope with adversity. Most of them were raped and experienced a lot of violence,” Ms. Alama says about internally displaced women in Cameroon, adding that sharing their testimonies with each other during the 10-day event was therapeutic.
Daniella, a native of the embattled northwest region of Cameroon who left her home in 2019 because of the Anglophone crisis, was one of the beneficiaries of the JRS camp initiative.
In the April 25 report, Daniella says, “There were so many killings around us. When the crisis started, they burned homes, and they also killed one of my cousins, so I decided to move to Yaoundé.”
Daniella who faced a language challenge as she could only communicate in English and not French is further quoted as saying, “I didn’t know a day could be like this in my life. I have learned from the GLOW camp that, as a girl, I should not minimize myself. I can do what a man can do.”
On her part, Nadine, another beneficiary of the camp, is quoted as saying, “In the GLOW camp, I learned that no one can force a woman to get married. Not even the family. I also learned about GBV (Gender-based violence): how I can deal with it, overcome it, and denounce it.”
Source : Aciafrica