Are Women with Disabilities Treated with Special Concern? A Discourse About the Interrelationship Between Gender-Based Violence and Women with Disabilities in Southern Africa

Abstract

In 1985 the United Nations held a world conference to review and appraise the achievements of the decade for women. At this conference held in Nairobi, Kenya, the delegates earmarked the protection of women with sensory, physical, and mental disabilities as one of the areas of special concern. In 1991, the CEDAW in it's General Recommendation 18 reaffirmed this stance and called for State parties to ensure that women with disabilities are equally protected in society. Therefore, in this paper, I bring out the interconnection between GBV and women with disabilities in four Southern African Countries, namely, Malawi, South Africa, Zambia, and Zimbabwe. The paper will highlight the violence that women with disabilities face in the region, from four different country perspectives. In addition, I also aim at evaluating the effectiveness of the laws which are in place in these countries which aim at protecting women with disabilities from GBV.

Keywords: gender-based violence; women with disabilities; albinism; rape; southern Africa; Zambia; South Africa; Malawi; Zimbabwe

JEL Classification: 110,112,118,K33