Victoria's South Sudanese women want to talk about family violence
Family violence has become a much more widely publicised issue in Victoria in recent years, but among the state's South Sudanese community it's still a problem that remains largely unspoken.
That's why South Sudanese women from Melbourne's south-eastern suburbs gathered on Saturday for the area's inaugural Family Wellbeing Conference in Mulgrave, where many of the women in the audience were educated about family violence for the first time.
The day was about empowering and informing women in the South Sudanese community so that they knew how to get help, or assist others in doing so.
"This community haven't talked about it very much," African Women And Families Network (AWFAN) chairperson and conference organiser Therese Sengaaga Ssali said. "We want to look at prevention and also how to deal with young people struggling to communicate in their family."
The women heard from Victorian minister for multicultural affairs Robin Scott, from staff at the Dispute Settlement Centre of Victoria and from Victoria Police, who covered everything from the basics of 'what is domestic violence?' to how police can help in such situations.
Ms Sengaaga Ssali - who is from Uganda and runs AWFAN for all African women - does not believe that family violence is more prevalent in Victoria's South Sudanese community than it is in any other area of society, but said it was important these women were educated about it so they could transfer that knowledge to their families.
"It covers topics like how to improve communication with teenagers. What sort of barriers might cause children to get into trouble, how to deal with young people and help them communicate within their family too," Ms Sengaaga Ssali said.
"African women need a network group. Ours covers all African women. We do social activities, organise forums and networks."
Nyajang Deiwal, 39, is a full-time business student and a mother of six. Saturday was the first time she had attended an event about family violence that was curated specifically for her community.
"It is one of the things that is affecting the community," she said. "Most of the problems in the families are to do with violence - family or public. It is affecting them.
"People who are experience family violence say they want to know more about dispute settlements, for example, because they could maybe go there instead of the police."
Mary Kuth works in aged care and has seven children, all but one of whom has moved out of home with their own families. She has 12 grandchildren. The 60-year-old came to Australia in 2004 and Saturday was the first time she had attended an event addressing domestic violence.
She was interested in learning about the role that parents can play in helping children to have better relationships when they get older.
"When we yell at them, all of them end up on the street and they are not happy," Ms Kuth said.
"You want to know what gets them sad, so you can discuss it with them and to help them live peacefully."