Niyi Ojuolape, United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) Country Representative, has attributed Ghana’s slow progress in fighting gender-based violence to the patriarchal nature of society.

According to him, the patriarchal nature of institutions and systems is making it nearly impossible for people to appreciate the dangers of gender-based violence to the victims and as such does not compel the relevant stakeholders to expedite actions towards clamping down on all gender-related violence and crime.

“Because of the patriarchal nature of our society, many people have come to accept the incidence of domestic violence and gender-based violence as normal and so we have quite a number of victims and survivors of such crimes and the numbers keep increasing because the approach remains the same,” he said at UNFPA’s climax of the 16 Days of Activism Arts Exhibition.

Mr. Niyi Ojoulape further called on the entire citizenry to champion the agenda and activism against gender-based violence by making conscious efforts of educating people against such crimes and reporting abusers and perpetrators to the relevant state institutions and security services.