Georgetown : Putting measures in place to allow for women’s access to justice has been regarded as extremely important in light of the fact that they are deemed one of the vulnerable groups of the society. This notion was recently underscored by Managing Director of Guyana Legal Aid Clinic, Attorney-at-law Simone Morris Ramlall, who revealed that there is glaring evidence to suggest that “women will experience peculiar challenges in their pursuit of justice.”
In fact, according to Morris-Ramlall, the United Nations ‘Women’s 2011-2012 Report on Progress of the World’s Women’ recognizes that women have a variety of perceptions in relation to their definition of justice. These perceptions, she said, are closely linked to the injustices women constantly see and experience around them. “Women face social, economic and cultural barriers as they seek justice. Whether a woman comes from the rural or urban area determines the kind of access to justice she is able to pursue and get,” Morris-Ramlall said.
The Justice System, she added, consists of the processes by which law is maintained and ultimately depends on the individual situation. She further explained that it provides the means for resolving disputes about the laws governing occupation even as she revealed that “it has been opined that for hundreds or perhaps even thousands of women and girls, the reality is that the Rule of Law means little in practice and that effective implementation of laws and constitutional guarantees is a key challenge for making it a reality for women.”
As a result, it has been established that the Justice System or the justice trail is often broken down due to lack of capacity and discriminatory attitudes of service providers including those within the police force and the judiciary, Morris-Ramlall asserted. She further pointed out that services that do not take into account the barriers that women face are also a major problem. Among these barriers, she revealed, are: cost, distance, lack of knowledge of their rights or the formal justice system and could also include the threat of social sanction or stigma.
Moreover, because of these barriers cases are often dropped even before they reach to court thereby denying women justice. This, according to the Attorney-at-law, has caused one writer to describe the current system of justice as “a two-edged sword…although there to make women’s lives comfortable it presents daunting challenges to many women who end up just not using the system.”
In fact, according to the Legal Aid Head, one study on ‘Women’s access to justice in New Zealand’likened the Justice System to “a public building which some citizens cannot find or use its pathways; some cannot afford the price of entry and some find the corridors to the rooms they need to visit so cluttered as to be impassable. They are compelled to exist through the building’s windows rather than its doors.”
Barriers such as these, according to Morris-Ramlall, thwart the achievement of the justice system’s purpose, that is, to secure the protection of lawful and just outcomes for all. Women, she pointed out are more likely to encounter these barriers.
According to Morris-Ramlall, access to justice has several components, primary among them being access to Government or Civil Society-sponsored legal aid services such as access to information about legal rights and responsibilities, legal counseling, legal advice, legal representation and other legal advocacy services. Secondly it is the physical access to the structures or mechanisms where people can take their problems as they pursue justice. It also includes application of constitutional provisions of human rights and legislations in order to do justice for all manner of persons irrespective of their social, political, economical or cultural standing, Morris-Ramlall added.
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