By Mary Karugaba and Henry Sekanjako

The Speaker of Parliament has called for increased protection of women and the girl child in Uganda and around the world.

Speaking at the UN headquarters on the Status of Women conference, Rebecca Kadaga said that there is no place for the marginalization and mistreatment of women and the girl child in Uganda.

Kadaga, said that to stop violence against women, training needs to be given to every one including the Police.

“Listening to what other countries are doing, we need to increase the level of advocacy with in the community and even in schools and also increase the training of law enforcement agencies so that they are able to offer protection and ensure that they put an end to violence against women,” she said.

The New York conference is being hosted by the Inter- Parliamentary Union and the United Nations Entity for Gender Equality and the Empowerment of Women (UN Women) and it is focusing on Parliamentary strategies for tracking violence against women and girls.

According to a statement released by the office of the Speaker, the UN Deputy Secretary General, Jan Eliasson noted that ending violence against women should be a matter of life and death.

 “The problem pervades all countries, even in the most stable and developed regions,” Eliasson said during the opening of the two-week conference.

Eliasson stressed that it will take multiple approaches to tackle this issue, from governments implementing policies to empower victims and prosecute perpetrators, to creating a culture where gender stereotypes are broken by encouraging men and boys to take an equal share of responsibilities in their home and families.

“Violence against women pervades war zones as well as stable communities, capitals as well as the countryside, public space as well as the private sphere,” he said. “Since it is an unacceptable feature of daily life, we have to respond everywhere and on every level,” Kadaga said.