How do we win the war against Covid-19 if men refuse to listen?

The good relations within families continue to disintegrate as some men are continuing to spend more time outside the households or at friends’ places, drinking alcohol in groups and coming back home late in the night to wage war against wives and children.

“I am saddened by the rise in the number of domestic violence cases that we are now dealing with on a daily basis,” Munna Ndi Nnyi’s Dr Bardwell Mufunwaini said. “How do we win the war against Covid-19 when there are men who still refuse to stay home?”

In particular, the most disturbing case was one of a husband and father of three who had taken to the habit of drinking with friends all day long and returning in the night to wake up his wife and children and then swear at them.

“He swears at them using graphic vulgarities, so that the victims had to move out of their home and find another place to stay,” he said. “He tried to ask the family members to forgive him, but they refused to come back home to live with him because it was not the first time he had abused them emotionally. Now the once-beautiful family is torn apart.”

Mufunwaini stated that many men found living in the same household with their families hard and they could provide no valid reason.

“When we ask them the reason why they are moving out of their homes, they say they are afraid to cause violence in the homes because the wives are troublesome and annoying,” he said. “It appears to us that they are not used to spending quality time with their loved ones. They had been living as strangers for a very long time.”

The organisation appealed to all people to try to find common ground and live in peace in their homes. “Stop seeking and consuming alcohol via illegal means because we need to stick together as a nation during these hard times,” he said. “Alcohol will always be there, and you can buy plenty of it and drink as much as you need, right after the lockdown. Now we need to focus on the fight against the coronavirus.”

According to Mufunwaini, many men think that the lockdown is a bad idea that is oppressive. “They are failing to understand that it is only for their own good,” he said. “Even those alcohol sellers who feel that their beers are not being bought, now that they are continuing to sell illegally and people are buying and risking their lives to Covid-19, if they all were to catch the virus and die, who will then buy your beers?”

He added: “I am further disturbed by the youths who are walking out of shops here in Vhembe District, puffing on cigarettes even after it was announced that selling cigarettes is illegal during the lockdown. We can’t effectively win this fight against the coronavirus if we still have arrogant shop owners who do not follow the laws of this country.”

Those who need the free services of Munna Ndi Nnyi can reach Mufunwaini on 079 595 0010 or 083 596 7281.

Date:17 April 2020

By: Tshifhiwa Mukwevho

Tshifhiwa Given Mukwevho was born in 1984 in Madombidzha village, not far from Louis Trichardt in the Limpopo Province. After submitting articles for roughly a year for Limpopo Mirror's youth supplement, Makoya, he started writing for the main newspaper. He is a prolific writer who published his first book, titled A Traumatic Revenge in 2011. It focusses on life on the street and how to survive amidst poverty. His second book titled The Violent Gestures of Life was published in 2014.

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