LILONGWE-(MaraviPost)-Malawi Interfaith AIDS Association (MIAA) on Friday joined the bandwagon of concerned stakeholders with the word of hope forgiveness on gender based violence that occurred to Mpingu, Msundwe and Mbwatalika residents in the rural Lilongwe.
MIAA, a faith-based national consortium of religious mother bodies that to respond to HIV and AIDS in Malawi by adopting a faith inclusive approach thought of visiting the residents following the October 8, 2019 fracas that ended up some women being raped by police officers.
MIAA’s Acting Executive Director Pirira Ndaferankhande told The Maravi Post after interacting with the communities that the situation in area has been normalized.
Ndaferankhande noted that the residents needed psychological support from the torture encountered during the fracas.
She therefore lauded the communities for reconciliation spirit that daily undertakings be resumed as before.
“As religious grouping, we needed to move together with the residents on what they went through with the word of forgiveness that the past is gone for the future.
“We are gland to note that communities have accepted the challenge of not working in isolation hence the need for security, health services to be back in the area. We will therefore engage government to consider offering services to residents as before”, assures Ndaferankhande.
This week Madame Monica Chakwera, who is a wife to Malawi Congress Party (MCP) President, Dr Lazarus Chakwera also underscored the need for Msundwe women and girls, who were sexually harassed on 8th October, 2019 by some officers of the Malawi Police Service, to receive psychosocial counseling.
Madame Chakwera alongside Abida Mia, wife to MCP Vice President Sidik Mia spoke on Tuesday when she visited some of the women at Msundwe in Lilongwe.
Whilst bemoaning the behavior that the men in uniform displayed on the material day, Madame Chakwera said the women and girls who suffered the situation are currently going through a huge lot of psychological trauma which can only be overcome if they are consoled psychologically.
On October 8 this year, some police officers molested women and girls at Msundwe, Mpingu and Mbwatalika
It is not clear what their motive was; but some quarters have speculated that they were paying back to murder of one of them, Superintendent Usumani Imedi, who was killed by irate mob thereat.
Meanwhile, Police has instituted an investigation into the alleged cases of sexual harassment of the women and girls at the said areas.
