Gender Based Violence in Contemporary Namibia: An unsaid tale of changing male-female power relationships

The United Nations Declaration on the Elimination of Violence against Women definition of gender-based violence (GBV) demeans the fact that gender-based violence is used to establish, enforce, or perpetrate gender inequalities, keeping in place unequal gender-power relations. General consensus has been reached on the fact that, overall, violence become a means by which men assert and re-construct their form of masculinity, to preserve and reinforce the asymmetrical gender system of power. The disadvantaged position women have as result of their economic status, contributes to the magnitude of violence against women. This paper while assessing GBV in contemporary Namibia, will critically adopt the ecological framework used to rationalise the possible causes of gender-based violence. It is the belief of the authors that, particularly in the Namibian case as result of the post-independence societal changes, GBV is a way to continue exercising control in an environment where men authority has been questioned due to increased women empowerment