Chief Minister Lim Guan Eng and state representatives hope the Penang Goes Orange flyer campaign will drive home the seriousness of the crime. – The Malaysian Insider pic by Hasnoor Hussain, November 18, 2015.The Penang government today launched the Penang Goes Orange 2015 flyer campaign to combat violence against women.
The state has printed 12,500 flyers about violence against women, with facts and contact details of non-governmental organisations to go to for aid if one is a victim.
The flyers in Malay, English, Chinese and Tamil will be sent to the offices of assemblymen to be distributed.
Chief Minister Lim Guan Eng said the campaign was to drive home the seriousness of the issue, in tandem with the United Nations’s international programme, 16 Days of Activism Against Gender-based Violence.
He said keeping silent could hurt one’s own family members who are women.
"It is through education, awareness and preventive measures that we will be able to increase respect for women and reduce violence against them.
"The people must realise that violence against women is a crime and not a personal problem," he said during the campaign launch at the Penang legislative assembly building today.
Lim said between 2000 and 2013, 42,449 domestic violence cases were reported, along with 31,685 rape and 24,939 molest cases.
He said one woman in Malaysia was raped every 35 minutes.
"This does not take into account the women who are subjected to emotional and psychological violence, like having their lives and choices controlled, being insulted with sexist remarks, and harassed."
Lim also urged the people to be more alert and to play an active role in their communities, workplaces, and schools to curb violence against women.
"Support from the family, friends and neighbours is critical in saving the victims who suffer in silence.
"Not caring will only cause this crime against women to persist and plague the next generation," he said.
Penang holds the awareness campaign to stop violence against women annually in November and December, to mark International Day for the Elimination of Violence against Women on November 25.
Meanwhile, state women, family and community development exco Chong Eng said to close the gender gap, the Penang government had implemented policies such as the gender responsive and participatory budgeting project which allowedwomen to take part in the local government decision-making process.
The project won a special mention award from the International Observatory of Participatory Democracy in Brazil, she said.
Other women-friendly programmes include the setting up of a women's brigade in village development and security committees; the free mammogram checks that have benefitted over 1,600 women in the state; and a talk on women's rights in Islam addressing problems faced by Muslim women seeking divorce and alimony.
Asked if Penang would one day appoint a woman as chief minister or at least as deputy chief minister, Lim said DAP was committed in giving women better representation.
He said the party had in recent years amended its constitution to set aside 30% of its elected positions for women.
"We have to go through the natural process. Even in developed countries, they are setting quotas and making sure there is equal space for women.
"You get only one person by appointing a woman as deputy, and she may be regarded as mere decoration.
"We want to move towards having higher representation for women in the future," he said. – November 18, 2015.
Comments
Please refrain from nicknames or comments of a racist, sexist, personal, vulgar or derogatory nature, or you may risk being blocked from commenting in our website. We encourage commenters to use their real names as their username. As comments are moderated, they may not appear immediately or even on the same day you posted them. We also reserve the right to delete off-topic comments.