Indonesian minister compares Covid-19 to women

In one of his statements, Indonesian Minister Mahfud MD recently compared his country's efforts to slow the spread of Covid-19 to the control exercised by a husband over his wife. According to him, his nation must adapt to the coronavirus as a husband learns to live with his wife. "The corona is like your wife. You try to control it and then you realize you can't. Then you learn to live with it."

His statement quickly aroused the indignation of Internet users, shocked and disappointed by the minister's sexist comments. "Repugnant. I will await clarification! ", tweeted academic Ariel Heryanto. "If they don't like their (wives), why don't they marry each other?", wrote the investigative journalist Febriana Firdaus sarcastically on the social network.

The director general of the women's NGO, Solidaritas Perempuan (Women's Solidarity), Dinda Nisa Yura, said that Mahfud's words revealed alarming misogyny and sexism among members of the Indonesian government. "(His) statement not only reflects the government's superficial thinking process to resolve the problems associated with the Covid-19 pandemic, but also exposes the sexist and misogynistic mood of government officials, " she said in a statement on Wednesday.

Dinda Nisa Yura then explained that the minister had explicitly expressed the intention to subject women as a mere object by comparing them to the coronavirus. The director of Solidaritas Perempuan fears that this kind of unwelcome joke normalizes violence against women. She also added that Mahfud's words demean women by placing them as inferior to men. "When a public official says something condescending about women, it becomes a challenge for us as we continue to press the government to respect and protect the rights of women.", concluded Dinda Nisa Yura.

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Video by Juliette Le Peillet