HelpAge calls for protection of elderly women

Daily News Reporter

HeLpAGe International currently holding its 26th Africa Union Summit has urged the member states of the African Union to protect the rights of elderly women to ease their suffering in the continent.

The summit, which started yesterday marked the beginning of the Africa Year of Human Rights, with particular focus on the rights of women. Speaking at the opening session, HelpAge International Regional Director, Dr Prafula Mishra said the focus on women’s rights by the AU paved way for a huge step towards gender equality across Africa.

“But progress can only be made if human rights are protected at every stage of woman’s life. The discrimination that the elderly women are subjected to must be recognized and be addressed adequately,” Mishra said in a statement published by this paper yesterday.

Thirteen years ago, in the 2003 Maputo Protocol on the rights of women, the AU recognized that older women face challenges to their human rights requiring particular attention, including their right to freedom from violence and to be treated with dignity.

Despite this, older women continue to be discriminated against, subjected to different types of violence and abuse, denied access to health care and inadequate standard of living, and treated with disrespect.

In a study conducted by HelpAge International in Mozambique in 2012, 38 per cent of older women interviewed said they had been subjected to financial abuse since the age of fifty, 18 per cent to physical abuse, 5 per cent to sexual abuse, 42 per cent to malicious accusations and 50 per cent to emotional abuse. This level of violence and abuse remains hidden.

Data on violence against women is rarely available beyond the age of 49 and older women themselves are reluctant to talk about or report the violence they experienced. When asked how being treated differently because of her age made her feel, an older woman from Uganda said, “At times I feel affected and lonely, especially when I am told that what is being done and discussed is not for me as I am old.”

Another older woman, also from Uganda, said, “We feel isolated and alienated as if we are animals.” “Time has come to end this kind of discrimination and denial of older women’s human rights,” said Jamillah Mwanjisi, who is the Regional Head of Policy and Advocacy at HelpAge International.

She believes this year’s theme on women’s human rights could not have come at a better time as it would spur on the continent to heed UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon’s call to “leave no one behind” in the achievement of the Sustainable Development Goals, adopted by UN member states last September.

Older women’s rights will also come under the spotlight at the AU Summit when heads of state consider the adoption of a new human rights protocol on the rights of older people in Africa. Whilst this applies to all older people, a specific article guarantees older women rights to freedom from violence and rights to land, property and inheritance. According to UN data, there are currently 71 million women over the age of 50 across Africa.

This is predicted to rise to 111 million by 203