Page 22 - CoESPU Magazine 2017-3

GBV FIGHT
The New York meeting also heard that Rwanda has established several rehabilitation centers for
gender-based violence (GBV) victims. Isange One Stop Center which means feel welcome (in our
mother tang kinyarwanda) it helped addressing Gender based Violence cases in the countrywide.
Which provide free 24-hour medical, psycho-social counseling, legal, and safe housing services for
victims of Gender based violence (GBV), provide free services for survivors of child domestic
abuse and Gender –based Violence.The Center operates a free phone hotline for help facilitate
quick emergency
reporting,
information access
and rapid response
to GBV cases are
also in place and
protection from
further violence
and psychosocial
care and support
and collection of
forensic evidence.
In 2012 the Center
was awarded the
United Nations
Public Service
Award for its
service excellence in responding to GBV and child Abuse. About 44 other Centers so far been
established in district hospitals across the country. With the resolve to avoid a repeat of the past and
build a new, united and prosperous Rwanda, a marshal plan for Rwanda, was crafted through what
was known as the Urugwiro debates that took place between May 1998 and March 1999.Rwanda
unique history made her learn quickly how to find home grown solutions to her problems from
within, after abandonment by the International Community in 1959 and again in 1994.
In 2006, Rwanda Men’s Resource Centre was set up to coordinate the engagement of men and boys
in promoting gender equality. It is a key driver in fighting GBV by changing the patriarchal mind
set in the community.
The report adds that Rwandan women play a key role in promoting peace, unity and reconciliation
throughout the post-genocide reconstruction and recovery process.Women were appointed to head
key institutions intended to handle post-genocide reconciliation such as the Unity and
Reconciliation Commission and Gacaca courts where they constituted over 30 per cent of the more
than 160,000 judges countrywide.
Such efforts saw Rwanda become second globally on the 2009 Social Watch Gender Equity Index,
with only Sweden having a higher score.
At international level, Rwandan women have played a significant role in UN peacekeeping

missions, as peacekeepers and as police and military observers, in Sudan, South Sudan, Haiti, Ivory
Cost, Liberia, Mali and Central African Republic.

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