A Togolese opposition leader is calling on women to go on a week-long sex strike to protest the arrest of demonstrators ahead of parliamentary elections. Police arrested more than 100 opposition supporters last week during clashes between protesters and security forces, according to Togolese human rights groups.
Demonstrators have taken to the streets in the capital of Lome for weeks to protest new electoral reforms they say favor the ruling party ahead of October’s parliamentary elections. They are seeking a repeal of changes to the electoral laws. Protests continued yesterday, with a female opposition leader calling for sex strikes starting Monday….This people are funny, do you think embarking on sex strike would solve the problem????
“I am inviting all women to observe a one-week sex strike, fasting and prayers to set our arrested brothers and husbands free,” said Isabelle Ameganvi, leader of the opposition Let’s Save Togo. “So all you ladies have to keep the gate of your ‘motherland’ locked up to all men from Monday up to Sunday.”
The opposition leader said she is inspired by Liberian Nobel laureate and current President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, who in 2003 called on women in her nation to observe a sex strike to press for peace amid a raging war.
Sex strikes have become a common way of civil disobedience in recent years. In 2009, Kenyan women pressed for a sex strike to end bickering among coalition government officials.
Last year, a group of women in a violence-plagued area of the Philippines slapped men with a sex ban until they promised to quit fighting. Their stand helped end clashes in July between villages in rural Mindanao Island.
“We have power to change things. We do not want to remain in the kitchen, but we can have our say in politics, ” Ameganvi said. “We cannot stay hand-crossed, as our children and husbands are being kept in jail.”
In addition to the sex strike, she called on women to wear a special color during a demonstration Thursday.
CNN.