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A woman in an orange top with dark, long hair which is tied back is seen from behind. She is in the foreground and in the background you can see she is walking down a narrow alley in an informal settlement. She is walking towards shops and three men in the distance who are walking around.

Harassment in Informal Settlements in Dhaka

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By Wafa Alam, Shafinaz Sobhan and Bachera Aktar

Everyday many young men and women migrate to Dhaka city from rural areas of Bangladesh in search of work and in hope of a better life. Many of these people end up in informal settlements where they live in unhealthy and unsafe conditions, often subjected to harassment.

According to the Bangladesh Bureau of Statistics 2015, there are more than 3,000 informal settlements in Dhaka, with over 1 million households. Unfortunately, people living in those informal settlements are exposed to higher degree of violence and crime. Traditional gender roles often make adolescent girls and young women more prone to different forms of harassment, be it at home, in the community and on the streets.

What harassment do women face?

The types of harassment faced by young women in the slums of Dhaka ranges from name calling and bad comments to giving perverse looks, inappropriate touching, physical abuse and sexual harassment. School and college going girls, women living away from their husbands, and female garment workers are particularly vulnerable to such abuse.

The ‘mastaans’ (local goons), local shopkeepers and sometimes the unemployed boys tease girls and young women in the streets. During one of our visits to a slum in Dhaka, an adolescent boy said:

These powerful men (mastaans) tease girls and they know no one will protest because of their strong political backup.

These practices are often so normalized and socially perpetuated that people don’t even protest, let alone report incidents.

Stigma and blame

There is widespread stigma associated with harassment which means that it is often young girls, and not the abuser who is held responsible. This also means that families stop girls and women from seeking justice for fear of having their reputation tarnished. A young girl residing in Korail slum said:

My mother thinks that if I act (dress and behave) properly, then everything will be fine, but if I don’t, then boys will definitely say things.

She also said that when boys teased her on the streets, her mother told her not to give an ear to such comments. Her mother always tells her:

You are born as a girl, and you should behave like one. You don’t have to show that you are brave.

Incidents of harassment are often not shared with anyone due to fear of being blamed. One study reported that only 2.1% of the women inform community leaders about their experience of domestic violence, while 1.1% of the women seek police’s help.

A survey conducted by Save the Children showed that around 80% of the girls living in informal settlements in Dhaka are married off before the age of 18 and one of the reasons for early marriage was also found to be fear of sexual harassment. Young girls are restricted from going out alone, or going out at night due to safety concerns in the community. Together with all the issues explained above, the long existing practices of child marriage and other issues are perpetuated when a girl reports an incident of harassment, further depriving them of their basic human rights like education. This is aggravated by the lack of support from community and law enforcement.

Imperfect justice

In the few cases of harassment that are actually reported, police are either reluctant to get involved, or are in favor of the accused. There have been cases were the police coerced the victims to settle the matter out of court, or fix marriage between the victim and the accused, as they receive financial benefits from doing so.

Parents of the victims also seek help from local community leaders. The local leaders hold ‘shalish’ (informal court) where the accused may be beaten or charged a fine, if found guilty, or even forced into marriage. However, there are incidents where these local leaders also seem to only take strict action in case of influential people, and in other instances they victimize people who do not have important connections in the community. The consequences are often, if not always, faced by the girls and their families. If the families try to protest, they may be forced to vacate their house and move to another area.

However, over the years, communities have become more responsive towards incidents of harassment in their slums. Slum chairman, club presidents and members hold regular meetings where they talk to family members, men and women, and help them solve such problems. Women are now more concerned about their own safety due to awareness campaigns, rallies and the influence of the media.

These measures still do not consider that incidents of harassment are heavily under-reported. Moreover, while the situation has largely improved, there is still a long way to go before the communities transform into conducive support networks for the victims and harassment is indiscriminately eliminated.

Election violence graffiti in Kibera

Understanding violence in the slums: Resilience or normalization?

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By Joseph Kimani

The mere existence of slums is violence. Poverty is the worst form of violence meted on human beings by fellow human beings…The present system is naturally violent. We have to build a non violent system, a ‘civilization of tenderness.’ Fr. Alex Zannetoli

Violence is a monster that is omnipresent in low-income areas. Slums have become synonymous with violence, crime, criminalization of youth and ‘illicit’ income activities. The feeling of oppression and deprivation makes the entire settlements a no-go-zone. As a result, innocent, poor, marginalized and vulnerable members of communities who cannot escape or leave the settlements are trapped hence affecting their health and wellbeing.

But violence within slums is not inevitable. It is the consequence of structural violence against poor and marginalized people and state responses that exacerbate the problem.

Living conditions

In Nairobi slums the population density stands at 466 people per acre compared to 18 people per acre for the rest of the city. Since the 1990s city space in Kenya, occupied by the poorer half of its population, has not increased. While informal settlement’ populations may have doubled in this time, the rate and scale of improvements have failed to match unrelenting densification and consolidation. There are challenges experienced by residents living in densely populated neighborhoods. In a neighborhood like Mathare Valley (one of the oldest settlements in Nairobi) there are high levels of intergenerational and concentrated poverty. A young man in Mathare explained this process:

Here in our hood, you will find a young man who is at 17 years whose father was a thief, his grandfather a thug all killed by the police…this young man (now a teenage father) will die and leave behind his “wife” and a young child who will grow without even knowing who his father was. At this rate, this child will end up dead…if the child is a girl, she might also be having a story of disadvantage inherited from her mother or father too.

Densification in the slums without secure tenure is associated with poor housing. Slum structures lack adequate sanitation thus exposing young girls and women to sexual violence and degradation. Poor drainage and physical infrastructure puts pressure on households to pay heavily to access essential services that are of low quality: “…a significant poverty penalty which means that they pay a greater economic and social price for poor quality services such as water, sanitation, child care and health care.”

Employment and education

The youth-led Safety and Market Survey in 2018, facilitated by SDI Kenya, found that youths used lack of jobs as the excuse and reason for participating in crime and violence. Other studies showed that crime by teenagers between the ages of 14-17 years old was in the increase. A coordinator with Ghetto Foundation, a Mathare Community Based Organization stated:

I have noticed lots of young men and women getting involved in drugs and substance abuse in the months of Decembers to March. By this time parents or guardians are confused as to what to do with their children who are unable to continue with the next level of education (post-primary and post-secondary level).

While there have been increases in the number of school going children being retained in education until completion, the Ministry of Education in Kenya has conceded that if all primary school years are taken into account, it means only 40 per cent of those who started Standard One were admitted to secondary school. Children who drop out miss out on training and educational opportunities that require at least a secondary school certificate. They are likely to earn less in their lifetime and suffer more ill-health.

While this pattern seems predictable and obvious, it is important to note there are few programmes, policies or systems to ensure theses transitions are smooth and purposeful. Community members are left waiting for support from non-state actors while resources that seems available from County government are not used to address this problem.

Political processes

Kenyan electioneering happens every five years. In the fourth year heightened campaigns are accompanied by deep messages of ethnic hate and violence becomes a way of politicians balancing their political selfish interests. During this period, young men are recruited by various political interests to use force and intimidate their opponents. The zoning of some regions and areas as belonging to others and the issue of treating other communities as a threat is entrenched in the minds of young people. The youth get charged into participating in violence by attacking other communities and get rewarded for it.

Post-election violence in Kenya is solved after politicians agree to share power as individual leaders and call for ceasefire. Once normalcy resumes, no one remembers to ‘de-militarize’ or ‘de-mobilize’ the already psyched up youth from acts of violence, hate and crime.

Policing practices

While there is a lack or absence of state intervention in the provision of secure tenure, amenities and infrastructure within slums there is a very heavy presence of police that intimidate, kill, and harasses young people with impunity and with little accountability. In a recent Kenyan TV interview (Town hall discussion by Citizen TV 14th October 2019 11pm) a representative from the Kenya National Human Rights Commission explained that police are discriminating in their application of rule of law. He, stated that, every month in the slums of Nairobi about 23 young people (mainly men) suspected to be criminals are killed by the police. This has contributed to low levels of trust between the state and youths in the slums. On the other hand, the police or state authorities blame young people for normalizing crime and violence.

During a dialogue forum between youth and police, a young person rose to present a concern, perplexed, he asked:

What is wrong with us robbing or attacking strangers…I think if we don’t steal or attack our own neighbors then you guys should not interfere period!

Those in attendance were unable to connect where this kind of hate was brewing from. There appears to be a growing sense of gratification if someone is involved in violence and more so if the attack is on an outsider.

Young men and women are in a state of hopelessness and powerlessness. In September 2019 youths participating in a conflict management training vented about a number of issues. In their analysis of conflict and power, participants talked about structural violence and horizontal violence. On horizontal violence, they raised concerns about state use of excess force to deal with young people. Issues of extra judicial killings and continuous police harassment were discussed. In addition, participants talked of how youths have lost their self and social esteem and suffer from psychological and emotional traumas without redress. This has pushed some of them into a state of powerlessness. A youth participating in the discussion exclaimed:

No wonder, nowadays boys in our hood are joining Islam in big numbers – and not for faith matters but in order for them to be buried as soon as they are killed. We don’t want to put our mothers into the burden of fundraising for funerals…

Gender inequity

The SDI Kenya Youth Safety and Market Survey Focus Group Discussion in Kisumu interrogated the issue of sexual and domestic violence. In one of the responses young women claimed that, dealing with the issue was complicated given the political protection the male perpetrators enjoyed. One woman said:

A lot of times I feel sexually harassed by the same young men who hang in a base (a place where three or more young people meet and is perceived to be a gang space) near our house. My father is helpless, and all our neighbors are scared you might be raped. They did that to another woman, and nothing was done to them. I am scared to confront them since I don’t want them to attack my parents. I am hoping one day, they will get to be arrested.

Efforts by civil society and the local administration to curb domestic violence has not yielded results raising doubts as to whether residents are just coping with the situation or helplessly accepting the problem. A recent case in the media of a woman who had been stabbed 14 times by her husband left many surprised when she went to court to state that she had forgiven him and wanted him released so that they can continue with their marriage. Are people giving up in regard to justice systems or are they afraid of losing their loved ones?

Courage for the future?

Those who have the courage to deal with the issues do not get enough support from those mandated to do so. The health and wellbeing of the community is slowly deteriorating as segments of slums become occupied by young men who women who have given up with themselves, the community and the state.

In Mathare, Korogocho, Kibira or Mukuru slums you will find young people occupying structures/houses that are along the riparian or edges of the settlements away from the main streets or open spaces. “We appear once on the road to harvest and then disappear again. We know the police will kill us and the community will celebrate our death. We don’t care!” a young person in a focus group discussion claimed.

Unpacking these challenges, requires a multi-sectoral approach and multiple stakeholders who will stand in solidarity with the community. The approach to address the inequity, injustices and lack of accountability and responsiveness by those with the mandate to tackle injustice should be systematic and must engage those living in affected neighborhoods. In Kenya, 70% of the population is below ages 35 years old therefore making slums more of youth dominated zones. The solutions should be youth-led and must restore the dignity, sense of worth and power to plan and manage resources in addressing their own problems and opportunities.

 

Photo credit: worthbak under a Creative Commons Licence