Proposition 52K0743

Proposition de résolution relative à la campagne contre le "repassage des seins" dans les pays en développement.

General information ¶

Authors

CD&V Nathalie Muylle
Ecolo Juliette Boulet
Groen Wouter De Vriendt
LE Christian Brotcorne
LDD Ulla Werbrouck
MR Daniel Ducarme, François-Xavier de Donnea
Open Vld Hilde Vautmans
PS | SP Karine Lalieux
Vooruit Maya Detiège

Submission date

Jan. 30, 2008

Official page

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Status

Adopted

Requirement

Simple

Subjects

resolution of parliament developing countries human rights women's rights children's rights sexual mutilation

Voting ¶

Voted to adopt

Groen CD&V Vooruit Ecolo LE PS | SP Open Vld N-VA LDD MR FN VB

Contact form ¶

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Discussion ¶

Feb. 5, 2009 | Plenary session (Chamber of representatives)

Full source

Mr. Speaker, dear colleagues, the authors of the draft resolution are bringing to our attention a problem that may make some smile, but which is an extremely worrying and serious practice taking place in some African countries, ⁇ in Cameroon.

I recall that the authors of the proposal are Ms Hilde Vautmans, Maya Detiège and Nathalie Muylle, MM. Christian Brotcorne and François-Xavier de Donnea, Mrs. Juliette Boulet, Mr. Wouter De Vriendt, Ms Ulla Werbrouck and Karine Lalieux and M. by Daniel Ducarme.

All democratic groups have co-signed this proposal for a resolution which draws our attention to the fact that in Cameroon, ⁇ one in four girls, pre-puberty or puberty (between 9 and 13 years of age), are subject to practices that resemble torture. In order not to attract the eyes of boys at the time when they develop breasts, these young girls are subjected – often by their loved ones – to torture practices: they compress and burn their breasts, resulting in extremely severe pain that hinders breathing. Some of these young girls abandon school and leave their homes; they flee to avoid this practice and all its consequences (infections, burns, malformations, etc.).

The resolution draws our attention to this practice and calls on the federal government to act in this area, including by financially supporting information campaigns, persuading the countries concerned to take legal measures to prohibit this type of practice, and by supporting sexual education projects that seem very important, including contraception-related campaigns.

In the discussion, Mr. Herman De Croo intervened to ask what had already been done in terms of awareness raising. Ms. Vautmans replied that she had already questioned the Minister of Development Cooperation on this subject.

by Mr. Roel Deseyn was concerned about the lacunar nature of developments, to which Ms Vautmans – lead author – replied that certain technical data could not have been entered into the resolution tables.

I also intervened to draw attention to the fact that these were not the only worrisome practices, highlighting some of the "magical" practices: I think of the issue of witch children and albinos children, a whole series of resurgences concerning violations of the physical integrity of children in a whole series of African countries, and that the attitude should also be taken to these other problems.

by Mr. Moriau also spoke to discuss the wider problem of the status of women, ⁇ in Africa.

by MM. De Croo and De Vriendt questioned the scope of the parliamentary instrument which is a resolution.

Ms Vautmans recalled that the House Rules provide that the Government specifies, on the occasion of the deposit of political notes, how it has responded to the various resolutions.

Several members requested that we review all the resolutions that are being discussed and adopted by the Committee on Foreign Relations.

This resolution was adopted unanimously.

Finally, I would like to personally thank Ms. Vautmans once again for drawing our attention to this extremely worrying practice – this torture – of which millions of girls are victims. In our political relations and through our cooperation, we must ensure that such practices are permanently abolished.

I would like to thank the reporter. I will not comment on the content of these resolutions. Mrs Vautmans will be able to express this with her driven competence better than anyone in our group. Our group will, of course, approve this and the next resolution.

Mr. Speaker, I would like to draw the attention of the House for a few moments to the problem of resolutions. I will give some statistics. You will find that it is becoming an important tool. It is worthwhile to look at what we do rightly and what impact we have with this instrument.

During the 1999-2003 parliamentary period, 244 resolutions were submitted. 74 resolutions were adopted. This is a small thirty percent. During the parliamentary period 2003-2007, including ordinary and extraordinary sessions, 371 resolutions were submitted of which 57 were approved, or twenty percent. In the current legislature, including the extraordinary session, 266 resolutions have already been submitted, 18 of which have been adopted. Both of today’s resolutions may also be accompanied. This represents a small ten percent.

We must dare to face the instrument of resolutions. Some time ago, on the initiative of Mrs. Vautmans and of myself, a change was made to our Chamber Regulations. There are interesting documents on this. On 14 October 2005, the bill was presented by Mrs. De Meyer, Mr. Tilmans, Mr. Giet, Mr. Tant, Mr. Jean-Jacques Viseur, Mr. T’Sijen and Mrs. Vautmans. There is the report of 20 February 2006. The amendment to the Rules of Procedure was already adopted in April 2006.

The motivation of the first proposal was interesting, I quote from the summary: “Resolutions are a means for House members to, without legislative action, give the government a signal on a political level. Although a resolution is not enforceable in itself, this proposal aims to oblige the members of the government to detail in the policy letters they submit on the occasion of the budget how they wish to " - the government - "follow the resolutions adopted by the House".

In our Rules of Procedure there is an interesting decision, in Article 155. This article stipulates that every six months we must submit to the Conference of Presidents a list of the measures taken by the Government to follow up to the resolutions adopted by the House.

Colleagues, the last report dates from December 6, 2006, more than two years and three months ago. Despite the insistence of colleagues such as Ms. Vautmans, we see no follow-up to the policy letters. We must therefore reflect. Very important resolutions are usually unanimously adopted through good interaction in the competent committees. Either it is ad pompam et ostentationem, to explain it in ecclesiastical Latin, for nothing and we are doing important and reassuring political self-satisfaction. Either we adhere to our resolutions and the House, the main body of this country in a democratic order, has the will to ask the government to follow up or at least report on it.

I have here another letter in my archive, signed by the Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Home Affairs, who says clearly and was right at the time: “You must forward those resolutions to the Prime Minister. He appointed a pilot minister. This is also the case for approving or transposing directives or European decisions into our legislation. Then that Minister can follow the applied resolution event with attention.”

In policy letters that come into being nine to twelve months after the adoption of the resolution, there is a deficit due to the executive power. Either we honor ourselves and we unanimously approve thoughtful and pronounced resolutions – such as those that are being discussed today – and we do not put them aside, but we make sure that it is followed, Mr. De Man, and that the executive power reports us what could happen with it or not. Or we are going beyond the purpose of discussing major social problems, as we are going to discuss them in a few moments.

Mr Dallemagne was so kind to quote what I had done in the committee on this subject. Mr. Speaker, knowing you and returning to your first love, Parliament, we are confident that you will surely and firmly want to support us. Thus, we can give a new articulation to the Rules of Procedure of the Chamber and one can not boldly approve the budget of a minister whose policy letter, for example, does not correspond to the submitted resolutions. That would be a way not to eventually virilize itself, but to show itself as a real parliament.

I assume that you are returning to your first love, namely the opposition.

Mr. Speaker, I have always tended to not be very conformist, even when I am allowed to work in the majority. In order to level up Parliament’s toolkit and the dignity of the House, I dare to take this proposal.

Mr. De Croo has been in Parliament for several decades. I have been in Parliament for one and a half years and in that one and a half years I have known three Prime Ministers. However, this is another debate.

De Croo, I share your concern. I also intervened in the committee. In itself, a resolution is a useful tool, to ask a number of questions to the government, from the Parliament. I believe that the concerns and dissatisfaction of the colleagues about the functioning of the resolutions have their roots in the lack of feedback due to the government to Parliament. If we unanimously approve a resolution, as is the case here, then I find it normal that the government will get an answer to our questions.

We are asking questions to the government. We must therefore know to what extent the government responds to our questions. In that sense, Mr. Speaker, I would like to ask you whether you can take an initiative in this regard. What is your vision on the subject? I agree with Mr De Croo’s conclusion. If we continue to do this, if the methodology of resolutions is ⁇ ined in this way, then I think resolutions have little meaning, while they can nevertheless be a very useful tool for parliamentarians who have questions to the government.

I understood that point. I will take it with me and we will find a suitable solution for it. Ms. Vautmans has the word, as the chief service officer.

First and foremost, I would like to thank the rapporteur for his excellent report. I also thank colleague De Croo for his commitment to ensure that the resolutions were effectively implemented.

I want to talk about the content. Most of you had never heard of brushing breasts before today. Mr. Speaker, I spoke about this with you recently and you looked suspicious. Breast stripping is one of the best preserved secrets in African traditions.

It is mainly done to save young girls from a pregnancy due to a rape. Parents think that when a young girl’s breasts develop, she becomes attractive, she can be harassed, and she can get pregnant. In order to avoid this, it is taken care that the breasts cannot grow. Stripping the breasts is a terrible tradition.

How does it happen? I want to wake you up on this Thursday afternoon. It is done with hot stones, stampers, canvases, shells of coconut or pitches of fruits. They press those hot objects on the breasts of young girls, children between eight and thirteen years old. During the day, if the child is not at home and therefore one cannot hurt it with those hot stones, one binds a tightly strained elastic around the body so that the child can hardly breathe.

The psychological and physical difficulties cannot be overestimated. Abcesses, swelling, infections, malformations, burns, we have seen the reports all. The problem is mainly in Cameroon, but it is spreading. A German NGO reports that it is slowly expanding to Guinea, Togo, Benin, Nigeria and Ivory Coast.

Shockingly, one in four girls is faced with the fact that her grandmother, mother, sister or babysitter wants to stitch her breasts.

President: Colette Burgeon, Second Vice-President

President: Colette Burgeon, Second Vice-President

I have already said that organizations are active around it, and with information and prevention campaigns and with education, parents, grandparents, neighbors, cousins and nieces try to convince parents, grandparents, neighbors, cousins and nieces that stripping the breasts does not solve anything. It is fighting a evil with a much worse evil that solves nothing.

Today I would like to ask you to unanimously approve this resolution. We, as Parliament, must pay attention to this problem. We must ask our government to support those educational and sexual education campaigns in our developing countries, in our partner countries, in Cameroon.

We must also encourage these countries. You all get regular requests from ambassadors to see them. Check on the internet if these practices occur in that country and take your responsibility as a member of parliament. Send it to the competent ambassador. Talk to him about it. Encourage the parliaments in the window of the IPU so that those parliaments would take action to help that evil out of the world.

Dear colleagues, I dare ask you for your massive support. I dare ask you to approve this resolution unanimously later.

Mrs. Speaker, Mr. Minister, Dear colleagues, Mrs. Vautmans, we will of course join and approve this resolution. This resolution aims to bring the attention of this country to these unacceptable practices.

We only regret that, as usual, we are not involved in the preparation or signature of the resolutions. I was also not present in the committee due to illness to give my contribution. I want to do that with this.

We submitted a number of amendments. However, there are some facts in the explanation, in the presentation of facts and in the resolution itself, which I think we could go even further. It is a resolution calling on the government to support a campaign wholly aimed at women in a country where men are the major problem.

The next thing is going on. We must be careful to support all kinds of actions too quickly, too impulsively and too impressively without looking at the background. In this case, there is much more going on. No matter how horrible these practices are, the reason why they exist may be even more horrible.

For women to do this, for a mother to deform or torture her own daughter, there must be more happening than just a tradition or fear of a pregnancy. I don’t think African women are afraid of pregnancy or have taboo around. This is a very different continent than here. It is not about that.

The explanation speaks of unwanted attention and teenage pregnancies. It would be better to simply say what is really happening, namely, the arbitrary rape of women and girls by arbitrary men, passers, family members, everyone. That is the practice there. It’s not just about teenage pregnancies, but also about human trafficking, human trafficking on a very large scale, and slavery.

Women in Cameroon are wronged by not focusing on them. In fact, it is a minimization of their own problems. In a country where rape, human trafficking and slavery are part of social life, realities that every woman can face at any time, I think that in this case we need to go deeper and ask our governments and governments not only to support campaigns aimed at raising awareness of women about how bad those practices are, there must also be campaigns to put pressure on the governments of countries like Cameroon to ultimately eliminate all violence, women’s exploitation and human trafficking.

If we look at the history of Cameroon – which is not so difficult, we can do it today with a mouse click – we see that it is a country where slavery was endemic already before the colonial period. His own family, his own tribe and his own chiefs sold the daughters, girls and wives first to Muslim slave traders, later to German settlers, but mostly locally. What an abomination it must have been to know as an adult woman, as a mother, that people from their own household would sell their daughters to live a life in slavery.

The culture of Cameroon, the non-verbal culture, is, by the way, impregnated with the trauma of the history of slave trade. Their dances depict it. There are interesting articles from anthropologists and sociologists. The attempts of desperate mothers to hinder the development of their daughters’ breasts – that is what they are trying to do – so that husbands and brothers would not sell the girls, must be seen in that light.

Worse, the slave trade in Cameroon is not just a trauma from the past, it still exists. This is evidenced by reports of all sorts, reports of anthropologists and sociologists, reports held by the ILO or the International Labour Office, reports of human rights organizations and of various government agencies. I will quote a few passages from the U.S. government’s June 2008 Human Trafficking Report. There is first a description of Cameroon, a country where 51% of the population lives below the poverty line and where 56% of the population is under 20 years old. Cameroon is – officially stated – a country of origin, transit and destination for human trafficking, for women and children trafficked for forced labor and for commercial sexual exploitation. Most of the victims are children who are trafficked within the country itself, with girls primarily trafficked to work in households and for sexual exploitation.

Both boys and girls are trafficked in Cameroon to work as forced workers in sweat shops, bars and restaurants and on the tea and cocoa plantations. Children are thus trafficked outside the internal human trafficking within the national borders themselves, also to Cameroon, or from Cameroon to Nigeria, to Chad, to the Central African Republic, to Congo, Benin and Niger to work as forced workers in agriculture, fishing, street salesmen and in workshops.

Cameroon is also a transit country for children trafficked between Gabon and Nigeria and from Nigeria to Saudi Arabia. It is a country of origin for women who mostly end up in the sex industry in Europe, mainly in France, Germany, Switzerland and undoubtedly also in Belgium.

The report of the U.S. Commission on Human Trafficking in this case, but similar reports can be found in the documentation of other countries and governments, also states that the government of Cameroon does not meet the minimum standards for the eradication of this human trafficking. There is also no evidence that they are struggling to prosecute and condemn the traffickers, let alone to punish them. So far, the United States Commission on Human Trafficking report, from just six months ago.

A 2004 report from the International Labour Organization describes how children trafficked in Cameroon were forced to work in agriculture, households, sweat shops, bars and restaurants, and in prostitution. It also states that children from certain large rural families are "borrowed" as household help, sellers, prostitutes or babysitters in the cities, in exchange for money for the family.

There are also reports from human rights associations, including one from 2005, which looked at certain cases and found that girls in the country itself were trafficked from the provinces, from Adamawa, the north, the far north and the northwest to the big cities, to Douala and Yaoundé, to work as housewives, street sellers or as prostitutes.

There is also a 2004 study by the Cameroon Society for Prevention of Child Abuse and Neglect. The study found that of the 722 girls randomly interviewed in cities, 291 were victims of sexual exploitation.

Another 2004 survey suggests that Cameroon leads the world ranking as a provider of girls and women who are required to provide sexual services around the world. It is ⁇ that 40% of the children in the cities – Bafoussam in the west, Bamenda in the northeast, Douala and Yaoundé – between 9 and 20 years old were or have been victims of child prostitution.

What is especially remarkable is that in all these reports, the great silence of the Cameroonian government and the Cameroonian government is repeatedly pointed out.

It is especially in this context that we must place the horrible practice of rubbing the breasts. It explains, more than just a scare for teenage pregnancies, why women still do such a thing.

Therefore, we have allowed ourselves to submit a number of amendments. One must address the practice of stripping breasts, but in itself this is fatal when one considers that one is going to make it even worse for those women. They live in a country where arbitrary violence and injustice continue to exist. Meanwhile, those women themselves will be punished for such campaigns as a result of their desperate attempts to escape. Hence our amendments to eradicate both phenomena. When the causes, namely slavery and rape, disappear, it will be easier to make the practice of stripping the breasts disappear. Of course, addressing the causes is more difficult. It is also necessary to educate the male population. The men have always regarded women as livestock, as merchandise, but they must learn to see them as people, as individuals with their own dignity and rights.

I would like to advise the women themselves to use the resources they already have and to mobilize the United Nations with complaints through the Optional Protocol to the Convention for the Elimination of All Forms of Violence against Women, a treaty that the Cameroonian government – how ironically – signed already in 1981 but which for the rest does not attract itself. Furthermore, there seems to be no government in the world that is pressuring Cameroon to attract something from it.

This is the purpose of the amendments we have submitted.

Mr. Speaker, I would like to address the word to Mrs. Colen. She held a very long presentation here with a number of comments on the resolution, which, by the way, is a very good resolution. I am very sorry that this has not happened in the committee and that we must hear this here in the plenary session.

In addition to this, I have a few comments on its amendments.

I began to explain why this did not happen in the committee. I have been absent for two weeks, apologizing for illness. Additionally, such resolutions are never submitted to our party, neither to cooperate, nor to sign.

I explained it correctly, because otherwise you would have heard my whole statement in the committee and ⁇ you would have been convinced to approve some amendments to the resolution?

I think you can understand why different parties usually do not support your resolutions. I think that has more to do with the democratic aspect, especially when it comes to women’s rights.

Stripping the breasts is indeed a problem that affects women. I hear from the Vlaams Belang an amendment stating that the campaign should also promote a mentality change among the male population. Mrs. Colen, I remember that from the Flemish Interest you regularly commented that women were listening to the fireplace. I would appreciate it if you would not comment internationally.

Ms. Colen is still in your party. So that remains valid.

Mrs. Detiège, you can hardly remember that because you were too young...

I was not too young, Mrs. Colen, I was 16.

... to contain the arguments that advocate for an educational salary. It was in defense of women. I do not see the relevance of the discussion.

There is no problem.

Are you in favour of trafficking in Cameroon?

If you regularly visit those countries, you will also know that, when the resolution states that the information campaign is conducted by Renata with local experience experts, the NGO will involve men and women anyway. This concept has no added value.

Second, when it comes to criminalizing and harming unwanted sexual behavior, assault, rape and trafficking in human beings, you should also be aware that the purpose of this resolution was to focus specifically on breast stripping. Many members of parliament did not even know the existence of such a phenomenon. These were the main reasons.

Moreover, if one wants to extend the text to human trafficking, rape, assault, then one gets an incredibly wide resolution. We are speaking here specifically about Cameroon, Togo, Benin and Nigeria. Human trafficking is a wider problem. If you regularly pass through the Falcon Square in Antwerp – Mrs Colen, you are Antwerp – you can find that not only Cameroonian young women are victims of human trafficking, but a much wider group than you present here.

Therefore, the majority parties and also some parties from the opposition do not agree with your second point. The same applies to 5. So I just suggest that your amendments be rejected, Mrs. Colen.

For the rest, I would like to say that the commissioners are working hard on various resolutions on women, and that we should continue to do so. Ms. Colen may not know that a proposal for a resolution on rape as a weapon of war has also been submitted; we are therefore really working on those issues.

Mr. President, I will speak from my bank on behalf of Mr. President. François-Xavier de Donnea, who is co-signator of this bill and who, being abroad, could not be present today.

Our group will, of course, support this proposal for a resolution denouncing this kind of barbaric and unacceptable practice. This is an opportunity to recall, as Mr. Germany has done this in a committee, here at the tribune as well as in its report, which we also insist on the follow-up of the resolutions proposals. I know that the President of the Committee on Foreign Relations is also attentive to this. We will have to make sure that the resolution proposals we vote here in the plenary session do not remain dead letters and that the requests we make to the attention of the government are followed in effect, through a true follow-up table that will allow us to judge the action taken by the government on the basis of the recommendations of the parliament.

I repeat it. Our group will of course support this text to which Mr. Donna is ⁇ attached. I wanted to tell you!