By Milton Chitsime
Public urination
“Public urination causes environmental ruination.” How many people have seen women emptying their bladders in public? It is safe to point accusatory fingers at men of no shame for this shameful act. Surprisingly, there are numerous public and affordable nonpublic toilets in town. This invalidates the attribution of public urination to unavailability of toilets, as many would take as a scapegoat. The main reason for this animalistic behaviour is lack of self-respect and respect for women. Animals relieve themselves anywhere and by nature, they do not have shame over their reproductive body parts and processes.
If you pass through major kombi ranks such as Copacabana and Forth, and near alleys, you catch the
stench smell of urine, not from toilets but the surface and you wish you did not have a sense of smell.
These men seem ignorant of the fact that what they possess under their belts is a private part, not a public part. God made a private part sacred; therefore, its use should be private. Passing urine is a private affair, a closed door affair because it involves a private part.
Public urination angers God because it undermines the sacredness He placed on genital parts. How
disgusting is it for a man to drive down his zip, fish out his privates, and dart the liquid in public! This is typical of the behaviour of dogs that know no way to the toilet and even copulate in the street. Public urination is visual noise in the eyes of women and men, as well as land and air pollution. Lack of respect for women in this regard is evident as these men of moral deficiency tell off women who protest, arguing, “Chii chamusingazivi ipapa? Murume wenyu haana?” (What do you not know here? Doesn’t your husband have it?).
Shame on all shameless men that you may be shame-full.
Sexual harassment
“With sexual harassment comes sexual embarrassment.”
Sexual harassment means unwelcome sexual advances including verbal remarks and touching. It is an
order of the day on the streets for some men to mock a woman’s state of dressing, and physical looks. I have witnessed a man from a group of his colleagues insulting a woman: “Kuti une murume here mukadzi iwe nemapfekero echihure awakaita awa?” (Could you be married with the way you are dressed like a prostitute?) Others, when a perfectly rounded woman passes, comment: “Pamberi nekubatana!” borrowing from the ruling party’s slogan for unity but to mean “Forward with shapeliness.” No matter the looks of a woman, men should respect that and take a “ndezvameso muromo zvinyarare” stance.
In other cases, they whistle at a woman or boo at her, and in worst scenarios, touch her body parts. I am saying this from an eye-witness standing. One morning at Mbare bus rank, touts who counted more than ten from different buses contested for a female passenger who wanted to board a bus. They grabbed her bags and tugged her among themselves to their respective buses and ended up touching her body parts as they pleased. Men take advantage of the socially constructed inferior position of women and their limited ability of self-defense to belittle and degrade them through sexual harassment.
Profanity (vulgar language)
“Only fools utter foul language.”
A mouth that speaks vulgar smells moral poverty! A slight dispute amongst men provokes use of a vulgar word to rebuke the other party. Now guess that word. Yes, you guessed right. It is the female organ used for scolding and name-calling. Public places have become the major setting for public nuisance which is as good as public nonsense, mainly perpetrated by touts and dealers. When uttered especially in the presence of a well-regarded person, like a parent, a church leader or an in-law, one will wish if the ground could just open and swallow them! People who vomit shameful words surely have diarrhea running in their mouths, and their brains are contaminated with sewages.
One may wonder how profanity is SGBV when it is usually perpetrated at men by men. Name-calling the rival a using a female organ because he is wrong or stupid equalizes the organ with negativity, badness.. It belittles the organ and female people. A man is scolded: “Your womanhood”, or “You’re a womanhood”, but he has a male organ. Never will you hear the rebuke: “Your manhood” yet that’s what a man has, and not the opposite. That means a female organ is considered ignominious or worthless and a male organ should not be used in such name calling.
Way forward
It is time to carry out Operation Restore Ubuntu to throw GBV in the abyss where it shall perish. The
echoes of women, men and children chewing nails over violence against women will become the music of social change playing in everyone’s ears. This, together with the following suggestions will work wonders in stimulating a women-friendly social environment.
Breaking the culture of silence
The culture of silence promotes the culture of violence. “The world suffers a lot. Not because of the
violence of bad people, but because of the silence of good people.” - Napoleon Bonaparte. It seems both men and women have been bewitched to turn a blind eye to public urination and a deaf ear to sexual harassment and profanity, and their tongues are glued to the floors of their mouths that they can’t chastise these ill-behaviours. If you don’t squash a mosquito with your hands, it will keep irritating you, perhaps thinking you don’t mind its noise in your ears. Offenders are taking the public for a bin in which they can dump their garbage at any given time. Clearly, they don’t care the impact their rotten behaviors have on people, if they have the conscience at all. People’s silence gives them an impression of tolerance hence escalation of their insanity.
With the sacredness of private parts in our culture, vulgar language, public urination, and sexual
harassment are taboos that invite a “God forbid!” remark. They are an abomination deserving
condemnation. Nowhere in Africa should be an abomination left without condemnation. Let’s come
together to make some noise through peaceful demonstrations against these taboos. The idea is to
sensitize perpetrators on the negativities of their misbehaviors and sending a clear message that we cannot tolerate the intolerable, accept the unacceptable, and normalize the abnormal. Victims should report violence against them and people should exhibit zero tolerance to such incidences just as they do with pick-pocketing.
Law enforcement
Public nuisance and sexual harassment are offenses punishable in the justice system. But law enforcement on these offenses is evidently clumsy, thus the rats are taking the house for a playground in the eyes of the house owner. Do municipal police exist just for a cat and mouse relationship with vendors? Where are they when men of moral poverty pollute the streets with their stinking urine? Rampancy of these offenses is not a secret, and if by any chance it's a secret, then it is a public secret but hardly do you see a perpetrator held by his trouser by a police officer. The way police handle some reported cases leaves a lot to be desired. According to one Hopley woman upon reporting a case of sexual harassment to Hopley Police (now Southly Park Police), the police officer handling the case asked her to go and bring the offender. That was rather an insult to the victim worse than the offence committed against her. A word to the police force: you are custodians of the law and you have the duty to keep the bull in the furrow with a cat-o’-nine-tails.
Heavy penalties on offenders
The last time I heard, offenders of public nuisance were fined just $20. This amount is easy to lay hands on and is too little to compensate for the damage the offenses cause on victims. The fine is too light to turn the culprits into responsible people.
The judiciary system ought to impose heftier fines that dwindle the bank account of an offender. The
heavier the penalties, the lesser the occurrences of SGBV. Other cities in the world impose hefty fines on offenders to ensure effective curbing of the offences. For example, in Brussels (Belgium), law enforcers slap offenders with a fine of 250 euro. This way, people will learn to keep a civil tongue in their heads, and to befriend sanitary facilities. Anyone caught peeing in public should alternatively be made to mop his pee, lest women and the environment continue to suffer.
The battlefield is open to everyone in fighting our enemy SGBV. Our mouths are the firearms and our
voices are the ammunition we have to defeat the enemy. Women deserve some respect. Remember, it is a woman who bore Jesus Christ! Let us therefore maintain the dignity women have. Asante Sana!
About The Author
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| Milton Chitsime |
Milton Chitsime is a social worker from Harare, Zimbabwe. He is passionate about child protection, HIV & AIDS, Youths’ Sexual and Reproductive Health and Gender Based Violence. He is also an author of many books including Virtues of a Boy Child (written under pen name C.J. Milton) and Mbona Mbona: Kutsvaga Chikiti Chitema Murima.
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