Amazing GRACE! Being alive and reaching you in this covid season is a blessing indeed. I trust you and yours are well and following all the guidelines laid down by health officials to keep us safe. I need not tell you that applying self caution and self review is essential.
There are gazillion things to look at on this column. We would look at the rights of women, rights of wives based on customary or constitutional law. Rights of girls - we were that before becoming women. Rights of women socially, academically, politically, economically; as you know in many countries some are still paid less wages for same measure of work. We would look at the rights of “single” mothers. I don’t like that tag but it is what many understands. My preferred term would be unwed mothers (which immediately brings into focus unwed fathers), because no one single handedly “make” a child. We’ll look at the rights of mothers - within and outside the frame of biology. Many know that outside of formal adoption, many Africans take up this role. Do they have rights? Should they have rights? We would look into the rights of those who are separated or legally divorced and those who remarried. Of course we would not be done until we have looked at the rights of widows; death as we know is an inevitable fact of life. From time to time, I would draw from personal experience, including my own story and the story of other women.
In light of covid, the issue of human rights versus civil obligation has been thrown up with many across the world protesting their rights to be free to walk, run, swim and fly! To be honest, it does feel like house arrest to be locked in but it is a blessing to have a shelter to be locked in at. Millions who are homeless and holed up in gutters, junkyards and slums died without a record.
Ironically, many of those protesting are those who are under governments that granted the liberty to walk free. Countries like India empowered their security forces to whip, scare or detain, at least going by what has been widely reported in the media. Or are we to assume that the officers took laws into their own hands? Countries like China and North Korea did not give much room for queries; you disobey at your own risk, to the extent of your life. States like Lagos in Nigeria used, “show of force” by all non-civil arm of security, to let those brewing mayhem know that response would not be calm or cool but brutal.
Do you have rights during a pandemic? Of course. It includes the right to die, but if you fail at dying, be warned that suicide is a crime in most countries. But why elect to die when you can survive covid and be a beneficiary of blessings coming post covid.
No doubt many leaders rose up to the challenge of protecting citizens and residents but some used covid to violate human rights with impunity, which includes jailing those who may not be affluent enough to seek legal coverage. There are countries where government insist patients have covid but refuse to release results prompting outrage. It is the right of a patient who is not suicidal or underage to receive result as proof so he or she would take personal responsibility in yielding to treatment.
There are governments whose negligence, of those who are considered minority, led to deaths in thousands. A number of African Americans cried out. Widely publicised was a lady who was in tears about how her sibling was not granted medical attention until death. Another video went viral of a nurse whose corpse was seen being taken out of her home; the registration number of the vehicle indicates New Jersey.
Many wonder why death rate escalated in New York but an unguided and unguarded population, which is largely made up of the homeless, had a hand in it. The noise on media and generally was stay at home but no one spoke about behavioural change. Your rights mean government cannot compel you to observe decorum but in light of pandemic, your right to behave as you like, which may not ordinarily conform to the acceptable social order, would have to be subject to whatever order the government set forth to keep majority alive. Anyone who has been to New York City, New York would know how spitting out saliva, spitting out gum, coughing or yawning without covering mouth, touching railings, sleeping on the floor is tolerated and common. Sadly, these are behaviours that escalated covid to the detriment of lives.
Some government mounted surveillance which went beyond boundary to evade privacy. The list of impunity, under the immunity of quarantine order remains unprecedented. Many widows who were not able to file their taxes due to loss of employment were not included in stimulus cheques. Many seniors who had the care of nursing aides, were left with none. With medical insurance, healthcare was not accessible as priority was given to those with covid, related symptoms and those carrying pregnancy.
The number of lawsuits that would emanate post covid, I suspect, would be rather voluminous and immeasurably expensive to treat. Perhaps a blanket order would be made to dispense with all or most, otherwise most governments would end up paying for justice from borrowed funds. Already, many countries are in debt and talks are ongoing about debt forgiveness to help many cope.
Let’s look at the rights you have as a woman in a pandemic:
1. Right to life.
2. Right to work
3. Right to healthcare services
4. Right to speak
5. Right to liberty
6. Right to association
7 Right to be free from discrimination
8. Right to protection from abuse or violence
9. Access to justice etc.
Basically all rights, provided you are not incarcerated, only that the interpretation is now subject to the pandemic order. Association for instance was restricted in offices and churches but the right to associate means work and prayers could now be done online or on phone. Right to speak, being subject to quarantine order means you cannot publicly ask people to come to your house for the cure without risking arrest.
On April 16, the Carter Centre’s Human Rights Programme organised a virtual roundtable to talk about some of the problems and possible solutions during the covid era.
Hadar Harris, executive director of the Student Press Law Centre, and Jamil Dakwar, director of the Human Rights Programme at the American Civil Liberties Union served as panelists while Karin Ryan, the Centre’s senior policy advisor on human rights, moderated.
Here are five takeaways from the discussion:
1. Emergency Orders
These are permitted during pandemic (or statewide epidemic) to keep the people and properties safe. These orders must be proportionate, protective, based in law, necessary, and timebound.
2. Freedom of Expression
In many countries health workers had to snitch to cry out loud about lack of or inadequate personal protective gears. Some lost their lives doing this. Journalists across the world witnessed ban, or clasp on freedom of information. In Nigeria it was almost impossible to receive information on government fundraising. In the Philippines, people demanding government relief faced arrest and the president ordered those enforcing quarantines to shoot resisters.
3. Human Rights Crisis
COVID-19 is no doubt affected the vulnerable. Take for instance the widows, those living with disability who now no longer have the assistance of home health aides or those who lived on goodwill but can no longer sustain themselves since workers and schools are at home... Gender based violence escalated with the abused now forced to hole in with abusers. Over crowded prisons are feeling it much since social distancing is almost impossible there. This has led to the release of some prisoners.
4. Suppression of Equitability and Justice
While relief has been offered, this have not been primed to reach majority and a good number of those who are most vulnerable have been excluded - some countries gave relief via bank account numbers, which means those without bank account were excluded. Some gave those who filed taxes forgetting that a good number, who made income too low to report were denied an opportunity to file. In countries without data base it means the poorest of the poor were largely excluded. Covid no doubt have brought us to see that while legality and the need to be politically correct or to be seen as working, led many governors and presidents to act in the eye of the media, humanity should have led more leaders to consider the vulnerable - homeless, orphans, widows, those living with disability, seniors (elderly) and those who cannot demand their rights or have the benefit of phone to call the congress or social media to cry out loud.
5. Opportunities in New Normal
Blanket orders no doubt helped to save those who may have been subject to eviction at the nick of covid fatality. But gender based abuse was on the high rise and this should have led to a heightened protection against this. Sadly, many officials were too busy to plan for this outcome. A lot can be done now including campaigns and petitions. Walk With Widows Coalition began campaign to draw attention to the plight of widows; the scourge faced in developed and developing nations is definitely worse than covid. The campaign is slated to run from May 5 to June 23, 2020, the International Widows Day. You will agree with me that one day would never be enough hence starting 7 weeks ahead. Many are organising towards up coming election and raising funds via email and social media. Some are raising funds for college. Others are wooing those to sign political and non political petitions online. The fact that many are indoors also mean that insults hurled at government officials can go unnoticed provided you do not live in a country like North Korea where dictatorship is the norm.
It was Maya Angelo who said, “We promise to accept nothing less than justice for every woman”. And that should be the standard. But there are women whose conditioning has made them permissive of oppression as acceptable affliction or their fate as women.
As I close, to reach you soon again, it is important the government consider the rights of women to ensure that our nation runs on balance inputs as it is impossible for the male gender alone to take us to Beulah Land.
As doors continue to open, to return us to the old normal, the needs that previously stared us in the face would be more potent - affordable childcare, equal pay for equal work and the right to live free of all forms of violence. It is important that women of all race, status, literacy level, social class, spiritual and economic capabilities are protected from discrimination, dehumanisation and defraudment.
With many holed in with nothing to do but sex, the government better prepare for more babies and soon the need for paid leave to care for them would spring up on us. For now, only 14% of workers are covered under paid family leave offered in few states including California, New Jersey and Rhode Island.
Ultimately, the most effective way to push for better life for women is via increased political participation. Using USA as a benchmark, in a Congress with 19% women and only a quarter of state legislature, it is becoming increasingly difficult to find men pushing for better laws for women. Worse is the fact that fewer women feel obliged to introduce bills addressing the needs of women and children.
With countries presided over by women being the best examples of leadership during covid pandemic, it is very likely we see a boost in the participation of women in the next electoral cycle. Presidents of Iceland, Taiwan, Germany, New Zealand, Finland, Iceland and Denmark did not hole up in the kitchen making pasta while waiting for “daddy” to call the shots when he returned, they squally did! In taken charge, these leaders gifted the world a new and attractive way to shied people from the panic of pandemic and the risk or death.
Dear Lady, remember, before dragging about your rights with a mad man, regardless of his political or social title, know you owe yourself a responsibility to stay alive. This could mean physically removing yourself from the reach of a slap, a punch or a gun. Dead people are never beneficiaries of JUSTICE. Once dead, your right to file a claim on your own behalf is lost forever.
It’s Lady Law saying, you are important to God, your family and to the world. Please Stay Safe.
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