{"id":285,"date":"2021-09-20T13:55:12","date_gmt":"2021-09-20T12:55:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/nohumantrafficking.smom.rc.77test.co.uk\/news\/interview-of-cardinal-dieudonne-nzapalainga-and-imam-abdoulaye-ouasselegue-by-michel-veuthey-15-september-2021\/"},"modified":"2022-06-29T11:17:46","modified_gmt":"2022-06-29T10:17:46","slug":"interview-of-cardinal-dieudonne-nzapalainga-and-imam-abdoulaye-ouasselegue-by-michel-veuthey-15-september-2021","status":"publish","type":"news","link":"https:\/\/nohumantrafficking.orderofmalta.int\/en\/news\/interview-of-cardinal-dieudonne-nzapalainga-and-imam-abdoulaye-ouasselegue-by-michel-veuthey-15-september-2021\/","title":{"rendered":"INTERVIEW OF CARDINAL DIEUDONN\u00c9 NZAPALAINGA AND IMAM ABDOULAYE OUASSELEGUE  BY MICHEL VEUTHEY ( 15 SEPTEMBER 2021)"},"featured_media":286,"menu_order":0,"template":"","class_list":["post-285","news","type-news","status-publish","hentry"],"acf":{"focus_on":"no","breaking":"no","news_cover":{"id":286,"url":"https:\/\/nohumantrafficking.orderofmalta.int\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/18\/2022\/06\/SIRIRI-15-SEPT-2021-MV.png"},"news_content":"<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"INTERVIEW OF CARDINAL DIEUDONN\u00c9 NZAPALAINGA AND OF IMAM ABDOULAYE OUASSELEGUE   (15 SEPTEMBER 2021)\" src=\"https:\/\/player.vimeo.com\/video\/609761501?dnt=1&amp;app_id=122963\" width=\"500\" height=\"281\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"autoplay; fullscreen; picture-in-picture; clipboard-write\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>Please access the subtitles by clicking on &#8220;CC&#8221; in the Vimeo menu, available in the following languages: English, French, German, Italian, Russian, Spanish, Simplified Chinese.<\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"SIRIRI \u2013 Bande-annonce\" width=\"500\" height=\"281\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/4rcJGcpZey8?start=2&#038;feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<h2 style=\"text-align: center\"><strong>INTERVIEW OF CARDINAL DIEUDONN\u00c9 NZAPALAINGA AND IMAM ABDOULAYE OUASSELEGUE ( 15 SEPTEMBER 2021) BY MICHEL VEUTHEY<\/strong><\/h2>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>MICHEL VEUTHEY: Eminence, Excellency,\u00a0 thank you\u00a0 for coming to Geneva to bring this\u00a0 message of dialogue and fraternity\u00a0 that the Platform of Religions and denominations\u00a0 in the Central African Republic\u00a0 is trying to spread thanks to the efforts of both of you.\u00a0 Today, I&#8217;d like to ask you the question:\u00a0 what does this Platform do?\u00a0 What are the different faiths doing in the Central African Republic\u00a0 against human trafficking?<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>CARDINAL NZAPALAINGA: Thank you for giving us the floor.\u00a0 The Platform of Religious Denominations\u00a0 was founded in the midst of a crisis.\u00a0 This means that ordinary Central Africans\u00a0 were humiliated, mistreated and not considered.\u00a0 The children were enrolled in the groups.\u00a0 Many women were raped.\u00a0 Human rights were no longer respected.\u00a0 We stood up as fathers,\u00a0 because the man in charge of the platform, is a shepherd,\u00a0 he must take care\u00a0 of his sheep, and we stood up and said, &#8220;No,\u00a0 we can&#8217;t keep killing,\u00a0 raping, destroying,\u00a0 mortgaging our children&#8217;s future.&#8221;\u00a0 Why did we get up?\u00a0 To go and meet those who have taken up arms and tell them:\u00a0 this child you enlisted,\u00a0 who is innocent, admittedly enthusiastic.\u00a0 That&#8217;s why they&#8217;re cannon fodder.\u00a0 You, you have the future.\u00a0 Sometimes we ask questions to people and tell them, the leaders:\u00a0 &#8220;Do you have your son in the group?&#8221;\u00a0 In general, they say no to me,\u00a0 they don&#8217;t have their son. &#8220;You don&#8217;t have your son,\u00a0 so why is another&#8217;s son in this group?\u00a0 Is your wife in the group? No. &#8221;\u00a0 If what has been done,\u00a0 you&#8217;re doing to this woman, raping her,\u00a0 if we did it to your wife, would you be happy? No.\u00a0 We are here to raise awareness,\u00a0 to say that there are things we cannot tolerate.\u00a0 There are things that destroy us.\u00a0 There are things, really, that humiliate us\u00a0 and which show that the human being has lost his value.\u00a0 We must have the courage of truth,\u00a0 to go to those who only have weapons\u00a0 to talk to them and that&#8217;s one of the roles,\u00a0 one of the missions that the Platform not only tells\u00a0 in the distance to journalists,\u00a0 but to go in front of the executioners,\u00a0 in front of those who have only weapons to tell them. The role also,\u00a0 the mission of the Platform, is to question the government,\u00a0 because in a country,\u00a0 a government is responsible for protecting the population.\u00a0 When we see that dignity is threatened,\u00a0 in our motto, there is : Unity, Dignity, Work,\u00a0 dignity is threatened.\u00a0 Government, what are you doing?\u00a0 People are crying,\u00a0 since we become spokespersons of these people\u00a0 who are in the villages and do not see the political authority,\u00a0 the administrative authority,\u00a0 the judicial authority coming and meet them.\u00a0 Take responsibility.\u00a0 That is also our role.\u00a0 In a country as fragile as ours, which is\u00a0 emerging from a crisis that is still ongoing,\u00a0 there is the international community that is present,\u00a0 this community through the Blue Helmets,\u00a0 through the civilians working or humanitarians, we say\u00a0 you can also make a contribution to help\u00a0 so that this woman who has been raped,\u00a0 can be treated in a reasonable amount of time,\u00a0 to avoid negative consequences.\u00a0 You can also give your contribution, Unicef\u00a0 so that the child is not always in this group enrolled,\u00a0 and we can integrate him\u00a0 so that he can look for a job later on to work.\u00a0 You can also make a contribution\u00a0 if you can give an alternative to these people\u00a0 who took up arms, so we can leave the population to\u00a0 go about their business freely, not to take the population hostage.\u00a0 You see here some examples of the commitment,\u00a0 the mission also of the Platform,\u00a0 and of each religion, that we carry out\u00a0 to those you have called,\u00a0 who are suffering\u00a0 or who are still considered to be victims of\u00a0 trafficking, which are abandoned\u00a0 and we come to their rescue to make pleas\u00a0 and that we are here to hold their hands,\u00a0 to console them, to encourage them,\u00a0 to direct their complaints, their grievances\u00a0 in the right direction.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>MICHEL VEUTHEY: Thank you, Eminence. And you, Excellency,\u00a0 what can you tell us about this?<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>IMAM ABDOULAYE OUASSELEGUE: You know that this is a very worrying subject for\u00a0 us religious,\u00a0 because our fight\u00a0 is to give every living being its dignity,\u00a0 it&#8217;s in the Holy Scriptures,\u00a0 and therefore our work at the level of the Platform,\u00a0 but also in the congregations,\u00a0 we rely much more on on the words.\u00a0 We don&#8217;t have a prison,\u00a0 we don&#8217;t have a law enforcement agency.\u00a0 Our repressive force,\u00a0 is the scriptures.\u00a0 These scriptures\u00a0 contrast with the methods of barbarism,\u00a0 the methods of humiliation\u00a0 and the methods that deprive the person of his or her rights.\u00a0 That is why we preach\u00a0 through our lectures, our homilies,\u00a0 our preaching.\u00a0 We call on everyone to respect the right of women.\u00a0 The woman\u00a0 is a creature that I would describe as precious\u00a0 for the future of the entire universe,\u00a0 for the future of society.\u00a0 For us,\u00a0 we are basing this on the fact that\u00a0 the woman is the first educator\u00a0 of the offspring\u00a0 because it is she who gives the first care,\u00a0 so she deserves respect, she deserves that value, that honor.\u00a0 So for us,\u00a0 it is out of the question\u00a0 to make her suffer dishonor.\u00a0 That&#8217;s why I base myself on the teachings of Islam.\u00a0 That&#8217;s why it&#8217;s forbidden, even for a man,\u00a0 to have a relationship outside of marriage with a woman.\u00a0 If it&#8217;s already forbidden to have a relationship outside of marriage with a woman,\u00a0 what does this mean?\u00a0 This means that you would first have to meet certain criteria,\u00a0 certain steps to be able to\u00a0 be in communion with a woman\u00a0 and pretend to share\u00a0 the same hope, the same future with this woman.\u00a0 She becomes one body with you\u00a0 and you form a household.\u00a0 If you&#8217;re going to have children, you have to educate those children.\u00a0 It&#8217;s quite a process for us to protect a woman.\u00a0 So,\u00a0 in the end, we are in a State.\u00a0 The State is organized.\u00a0 For us, most of the time,\u00a0 if there are things, we denounce\u00a0 publicly.\u00a0 We raise our voices.\u00a0 We talk,\u00a0 we index,\u00a0 but it is up to the State to take its responsibilities\u00a0 to be able to get their hands on the gravediggers,\u00a0 those who violate women,\u00a0 those who humiliate women.\u00a0 The State must get its hands on\u00a0 based on information, credible information.\u00a0 That&#8217;s what we do every day.\u00a0 This is to reassure you\u00a0 that we, as religious entities,\u00a0 you raise for us a subject that concerns us on a daily basis,\u00a0 this is our daily work, the protection of women and children.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>MICHEL VEUTHEY: Thank you very much.\u00a0 Perhaps you would like to add a word,\u00a0 what does, for example, parishes\u00a0 or local groups\u00a0 do to reintegrate people who have been trafficked,\u00a0 whether they are children who are demobilized from armed groups,\u00a0 or women that we manage to get out of prostitution,\u00a0 whether they were adults who worked in mines or in agriculture\u00a0 and that we manage to reintegrate into their group,\u00a0 that we manage to get, I would say, on their feet,\u00a0 and out of slavery?<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>CARDINAL NZAPALAINGA: As you ask the\u00a0 question directly, I will answer you directly as well,\u00a0 the Catholic Church.\u00a0 I take the case of women who have been raped\u00a0 and sometimes have lost their honor in some places and\u00a0 where sometimes men reject them.\u00a0 We have a place,\u00a0 we built a house to say,\u00a0 the kind of people who are not well regarded elsewhere,\u00a0 we&#8217;ll take them in. Well done.\u00a0 They will cultivate the field.\u00a0 They&#8217;re going to redo the plan of their lives\u00a0 and maybe they can still leave\u00a0 to find the path of hope.\u00a0 At first, it&#8217;s nothing.\u00a0 There are a few people there,\u00a0 but that&#8217;s the point.\u00a0 We are looking to build a center for these young people.\u00a0 We already have the Salesians of Don Bosco\u00a0 who work with young people.\u00a0 They take care of young people who are in these difficult situations\u00a0 and they give them the chance, often to learn a trade,\u00a0 and be able to insert them, to be able to launch a\u00a0 new future, so I think that&#8217;s important too.\u00a0 We have women,\u00a0 a group called the &#8220;Christian Women&#8221;,\u00a0 who spot other women who are rejected.\u00a0 We&#8217;re working to integrate them because it&#8217;s not easy,\u00a0 when you have been raped, pointed out et cetera,\u00a0 well, there would have to be some who would defend you\u00a0 and who are like intermediaries\u00a0 to help you find your place and that you are a victim.\u00a0 You are not an executioner, so we don&#8217;t add evil to evil again\u00a0 to exclude you from society.\u00a0 So there&#8217;s this work that&#8217;s being done too and other.\u00a0 We ask each and every one to be attentive.\u00a0 There is the Justice Commission, that is true,\u00a0 the Justice and Peace Commission which is attentive in the neighbourhood\u00a0 to see if there are any such situations\u00a0 with the prostitutes,\u00a0 situations with perhaps other people,\u00a0 to see how to restore justice.\u00a0 How can we make sure that peace returns in society,\u00a0 in the hearts of some and also in the community.\u00a0 That is the role,\u00a0 these are some of the steps that we do at the parish level\u00a0 or even at the level of certain groups,\u00a0 at the level of certain congregations,\u00a0 which has as its vocation to commit itself to help children.\u00a0 That&#8217;s what I can tell you.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>MICHEL VEUTHEY: Thank you. Very interesting.\u00a0 Would you like to add anything?<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>IMAM ABDOULAYE OUASSELEGUE: Just a little bit at the level of the Platform.\u00a0 The Platform, today, is structured.\u00a0 There is a Youth Committee\u00a0 that deals with the concern of youth.\u00a0 There is also an office that deals with women&#8217;s affairs.\u00a0 In this office&#8230;\u00a0 Everything that concerns women,\u00a0 sometimes it becomes a taboo.\u00a0 We can&#8217;t talk about this with just anyone.\u00a0 Now, women among themselves,\u00a0 it&#8217;s easier to deal with the issues that concern them.\u00a0 That&#8217;s why there&#8217;s an office there\u00a0 that deals with these issues.\u00a0 Women abused, raped\u00a0 or who have suffered dishonour are sometimes identified, listed.\u00a0 There is an approach that is sometimes taken\u00a0 to come to their rescue.\u00a0 I would go even further, to help them gain access to justice.\u00a0 Very good.\u00a0 There are already mechanisms in place.\u00a0 This is at the level of the Platform of\u00a0 religious denominations, of which we are the representatives.\u00a0 At the denominational level, as the Cardinal said,\u00a0 at the level of the Supreme Islamic Council,\u00a0 we have an office called National Office of Muslim Women.\u00a0 In this office, there is a committee\u00a0 that takes care of orphans, widows\u00a0 and abused women.\u00a0 It&#8217;s very hierarchical and the subject is dealt with at that level.\u00a0 We can&#8217;t afford to put in the public arena\u00a0 the problems that concern this dishonoured class of people.\u00a0 But we are aware of this situation.\u00a0 This is why mechanisms are put in place\u00a0 to deal with the issue.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>MICHEL VEUTHEY: Very well.\u00a0 Thank you very much. I know you are expected,\u00a0 so I would like to not only thank you\u00a0 but really wish you success in all that you do,\u00a0 and also that the message that you have tried to carry\u00a0 in the film &#8220;Siriri, the Cardinal and the Imam&#8221;\u00a0 is really well understood\u00a0 and that your work on behalf of victims of trafficking, to prevent trafficking,\u00a0 to fight it, to rehabilitate all these victims can continue.\u00a0 In any case, thank you.\u00a0 Best wishes.\u00a0 I hope we stay in touch\u00a0 and that we can support your action. Thank you.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>L\u2019Imam Oumar Kobin\u00e9 Layama<\/p>\n","news_gallery":"no","evidence":"no"},"news_categories":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/nohumantrafficking.orderofmalta.int\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/notizie\/285","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/nohumantrafficking.orderofmalta.int\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/notizie"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/nohumantrafficking.orderofmalta.int\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/news"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/nohumantrafficking.orderofmalta.int\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/notizie\/285\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nohumantrafficking.orderofmalta.int\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/286"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/nohumantrafficking.orderofmalta.int\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=285"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}