Most Birth Control Measures Still Not Made Safe For Women. Why? - Minority Africa
Toluwani Omotesho
March 13, 2024
But first, in Sudan, there has been a collapse of internet connectivity amid the brutal 10-month civil war.
According to Netblocks, an internet monitoring firm, there has been a complete shutdown of internet and phone networks since Friday, February 2, 2024. It started with the Rapid Support Forces (RSF) seizing control of internet service providers’ (ISP) data centers in Khartoum, Sudan’s capital city. This resulted in the total shutdown of MTN Sudan, Zain Sudan, and Sudani, which are the major ISPs in the country, disconnecting about 14 million people from the internet.
Since the outbreak of the ongoing civil war, 8 million Sudanese have been forcibly displaced, and nearly 18 million are currently experiencing food insecurity. The recent internet blackout only further poses severe challenges for citizens as access to humanitarian aid will become more complex. Also, people cannot access lifesaving information, healthcare, or banking services, making them unable to flee the conflict or travel to safe zones.
Unfortunately, Sudan has a track record of shutting down the internet during civil unrest to control the flow of information. In 2022, internet access was cut off on at least four different occasions during protests after the military coup in 2021. The Rapid Support Forces (RSF) have decided to remain silent regarding the recent internet blackout.
However, in the meantime, human rights organizations and a non-profit Sudanese Organization, Digital Rights Lab, are working to end the disruption of internet access across the country.
Over 500,000 Displaced Sudanese Flee To South Sudan Seeking Refuge
‘My search for intimacy led me to chemsex, now I’m trying to regain control’
Did you know Ghana was the African country to gain independence from colonial rule in 1957? This paved the way for other African nations in the struggle for independence.
Formal education is a farce for blind and visually impaired people in Cameroon
Cameroon’s formal education system is keeping out blind and visually impaired students, and it doesn’t stop there.
In 2016, when I enrolled in university to study journalism and mass communication, my very first class ended on a very poor note. The lecturer told me that journalism, my program of choice, was not for blind people like me and that I was the first blind student in the university’s almost three-decade history. He said that my decision to study was a “mere waste of time” and that I was becoming a “burden to people’s children.”
I have been aware of how difficult it is for blind and visually impaired people to get a formal education for most of my life. Some of this was due to the narrative government officials created that providing accessible education for people with visual disabilities is a waste of resources. Most of it, however, was that while in school in Cameroon myself, I would come to experience this firsthand.
What can African history teach us about queer belonging?
Framing conversations about queerness around the modernity of first-world nations and their global influence does a poor job of recognizing the ancientness of queer identities and how they often manifested all around the world in pre-colonial societies.
From the 1960s to the early 1980s, Ukonu’s Club was hailed as Eastern Nigeria’s most popular television program. The show featured a variety of entertainers like Mazi Ukonu, the show’s namesake, and Christy Essien. In the 1970s, one unique entertainer made a name for themselves on the show, an individual by the name of Area Scatter.
The story of Area Scatter begins sometime during the Civil War, when Scatter, previously a civil servant, disappears into the forest and emerges seven months and seven days later as a well-endowed woman. Per their admission, the gods had blessed them with supernatural powers that enhanced their musical talent and feminine qualities.
Three People in Russia Have Already Been Charged for Displaying Rainbows
Three people in Russia have been charged for displaying rainbow symbols in public after the country’s Supreme Court issued a draconian ruling last November declaring that the “international public LGBT movement” is an “extremist organization.” These are the first convictions following the ruling, as Reuters reported.
On Monday, artist and photographer Inna Mosina was hit with a ₽1,500 ($16 USD) fine for Instagram posts featuring rainbow flags, according to the Associated Press. Although Mosina’s legal team argued that the posts were published before the November ruling took effect, the court ordered her to pay the fine regardless.
This incident follows a pair of convictions last week. Last Thursday, a court in Volgograd charged a man who had posted a photograph of an LGBTQ+ flag with “displaying the symbols of an extremist organization,” ordering him to pay a fine of 1,000 rubles (roughly $11 USD), according to Reuters.
The Taliban and the Global Backlash Against Women’s Rights
The crisis in Afghanistan has largely disappeared from the news. It was pushed aside by the war in Ukraine and the humiliation and fatigue of Western countries whose twenty years of military and civilian intervention ended in dust and defeat. As a new war unfolds in the Middle East, Afghans do not have the option just to move on and forget—for women and girls in particular, life under the Taliban involves ever-deepening misery.
In the more than two years since seizing control of Afghanistan in August 2021, the Taliban have carried out a relentless and all-encompassing attack on the human rights of women and girls, violating virtually every aspect of these rights.
Afghan women are putting their lives on the line—facing surveillance, harassment, assault, arbitrary detention, torture, and exile—to oppose Taliban abuses. They deserve the international community’s full solidarity in their struggle. But the world should also stand with them because the events in Afghanistan—and the world’s response—have deep implications for gender equality everywhere.
Most Birth Control Measures Still Not Made Safe For Women. Why?
The pain 27-year-old Ramatu Adam* experienced during the insertion of her Intrauterine device (IUD) in 2023 was so overwhelming that she passed out. Not even the painkillers, including the local anesthesia spray, helped. She still struggled months later.
An IUD is a T-shaped device placed inside the uterus to help prevent pregnancies. Even though they are reported to have a 99 percent efficacy rate and need a specialist to put them in place, making them safer than some birth control methods, they sometimes come with side effects such as cramps, clotting, headaches, anemia, and ovarian cysts. Ramatu lived her entire life in Kaduna, Northwest Nigeria before she moved to the UK in 2021.
“I was told to go [to the hospital] with someone, so I went with my husband. I experienced cramps, which they warned me about, and bled on and off for more than two months.”
At first, Ramatu thought it was because she had an existing medical condition, uterine fibroid, which limited her options, but the experiences she later heard about IUD insertions from some women were similar, even though not all women go through that pain during the procedure.
A Graphic Novel Finds a Relatable Hero in a Modern African Woman
One of the most successful African comics has no super heroes, and certainly no supernatural powers.
Instead, “Aya,” a graphic novel series, is full of everyday heroes, and topping the list is Aya herself, a young woman navigating the delights and obstacles of early adulthood in the West African nation of Ivory Coast.
Inspired by the childhood years that its author, Marguerite Abouet, spent in Ivory Coast and focused on daily life in a working-class suburb of Abidjan, the country’s largest city, the series mixes humor and biting takes on society, with a feminist twist — all vividly captured by Clément Oubrerie, the illustrator.
In the books, Aya and her friends go on awkward first dates, hook up and share countless shenanigans that celebrate Ivory Coast’s favorite sport after soccer — “palabrer,” or talking endlessly.
Features a roundup of fresh MA reports, announcements, events/workshop listings, and minority content curated from across the web.