The Fiji Women’s Crisis Centre (FWCC) has criticised recent calls to create a “men’s department,” saying the idea reflects a deep misunderstanding of gender inequality and threatens progress on women’s rights.
FWCC co-ordinator Shamima Ali said the existing Ministry for Women and the national women’s machinery were created to address long-standing discrimination, not to provide special privileges.
“Women have been structurally excluded for generations, in law, in policies, economic life and national decision-making. That is the meaning of gender inequality,” she said.
Ms Ali warned that forming a men-specific department would shift focus away from women’s urgent needs in a country where men already dominate Parliament, Cabinet, business, policing, defence and religious institutions.
FWCC argues that a move as such would also drain already limited resources needed for violence prevention and survivor support, create a false comparison between men’s issues and women’s systemic barriers, and risk undoing decades of advocacy that brought women’s concerns into national policy.
“Women’s rights work remains severely underfunded. Redirecting resources to a ‘men’s department’ would undermine hard-won progress.
While acknowledging that men face challenges, including mental health pressures and the impacts of harmful masculine norms, FWCC says these issues should be addressed by strengthening existing ministries, not by establishing a new one.
“We support work with men and boys, but the solution lies in transforming harmful masculinities and improving mental health, youth, and social service systems, not in creating a parallel ministry based on a false narrative of equal disadvantage.
“Women’s ministries exist because the imbalance is real. Any proposal that ignores this is not serious about human rights or evidence.”
