FWCC and Fijian Women Lawyers Association event aims to highlight challenges women face in accessing justice, social services and welfare, among other issues

The challenges women face in accessing justice, social services and welfare, among other issues, will be highlighted at a Fiji Women’s Crisis Centre and Fijian Women Lawyers Association event tonight at the Tanoa Plaza Hotel in Suva.

The event is to commemorate International Women’s Day and the aim of the forum is to highlight gender inequality and the lived realities of women.

FWCC Legal and Advocacy Officer Stephanie Dunn says their counsellors will speak on the lived realities that survivors are experiencing in terms of domestic violence, rape and child abuse – and the challenges that they are facing in terms of accessing justice, social services, welfare, education opportunities.

Dunn says Fiji's rates of violence against women are among the very highest in the world, with 64% of women experiencing physical or sexual violence from their partner in their lifetime.

She adds violence against women was an abuse of women’s human rights.

Fiji Women Lawyers Association President Mele Rakai says they value their partnership with the FWCC as the FWCC works at the forefront, dealing with counseling services, awareness, education and lobbying - while lawyers are at the tail end of the process.

She says people come to lawyers for legal solutions often after exhausting all other options.

Rakai also said that the Fiji Women Lawyers Association , in collaborating with FWCC, stood to gain first-hand information about the realities on the ground from the Counsellors of the Centre.

Rakai says this also allows legal practitioners to better understand these realities, and gain more insight and recognize how they can assist the court as advocates.