The Egyptian government has established a 10-person specialized police unit to deal with violence against women. Announced in May of this year, the unit is operational and is being held up as a model for other countries in the Middle East to emulate. However, what seems like a welcome response to a pressing problem risks distracting from the far-reaching changes in policing that have been core demands of the uprisings across the region since 2011.
After two years of escalating violence against women, including systematic harassment and gang rapes at Tahrir Square, the Egyptian government responded to requests by the country’s National Council for Women to create a specialized unit with a strong emphasis on psychological support for survivors, with female police officers acting as contacts for victims. The National Women’s Committee in Yemen is making similar demands on its government, while Jordan has placed a strong emphasis on recruiting female officers, with more than 3,000 female recruits in 2012.
Female police officers and specialized units can raise awareness within the police about the seriousness of sexual assault as a crime, act as a gateway for appropriate referrals and support for survivors, and, deployed at scale, be a point of contact for women to report crimes. Particularly within the cultural context of Egypt and other countries in the Middle East, women often feel more comfortable reporting crimes to female police officers, especially when it comes to sexual violence and harassment.
In research for a new report by Saferworld looking at security barriers to women’s political participation in Egypt, Libya and Yemen, consultations with women suggest that most women, and particularly those who are activists in these countries, believe there should be more female police officers. One woman in Yefren, Libya, expressed a widespread sentiment, when she said, “There should always be a woman to go to.” Similarly, a recent survey from the Yemen Polling Center shows that less than 6% of Yemeni women are willing to go alone to a police station to report a crime, but 44%t report they would be willing to do so if they knew there was a women’s unit there. Similarly, in Egypt, fears over how the police would respond to reported abuse are among the biggest reasons why women do not report harassment.
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