Fiji’s rates of violence against women and girls are among the very highest in the world:
• 64% of women who have ever been in an intimate relationship have experienced physical and/or sexual violence by a husband or intimate partner in their lifetime and 24% are suffering from physical or sexual partner violence today.
• 58% of ever-partnered women experienced emotional violence in their lifetime, and 29% in the previous 12 months before the survey.
• 72% of ever-partnered women experienced physical, sexual or emotional violence from their husband/ partner in their lifetime, and many suffered from all 3 forms of abuse simultaneously.
• 69% of women have been subjected to one or more forms of control by their husband or partner, and 28% were subjected to 4 or more types of control. For example, 39% of women have to ask permission from their husbands before seeking health care for themselves and for 57% of women, their husband or partner insists on knowing where they are at all times.
• Women living with intimate partner violence are also subjected to economic abuse: 28% of ever-partnered women had husbands or partners who either took their savings or refused to give them money.
• 44% of ever-partnered women have been punched, kicked, dragged, beaten up, choked, burned, threatened with a weapon, or actually had a weapon used against them.
• 15% of women have been beaten during pregnancy, and one-third of these were punched or kicked in the abdomen by their husband or partner.
• 31% of women were subjected to physical and/or sexual assault since the age of 15 by someone other than their husbands and partners.
• 16% of all women were sexually abused when they were children under the age of 15.
• The majority of perpetrators of rape, attempted rape and child sexual assault were people known by their victims.
• 58% believe that people outside the family should not intervene if a man mistreats his wife.
• 30% of ever-partnered women are injured due to domestic violence in their lifetime; only about 1 in 10 tell a health worker the true cause of their injury, and many do not get the health care they need.
• 43% of women agree with one or more ‘justifications’ for a man to beat his wife: 60% agree that a good wife obeys her husband even if she disagrees; 55% believe that it is important for a man to show his wife/partner who is the boss; 53% do not agree that woman has the right to choose her own friends, and 33% believe that a wife is obliged to provide sex, even if she doesn’t feel like it.

The most common situations mentioned by women where violence occurs include:
• Jealousy by her husband.
• Her disobedience.
• His desire to show he is the boss.
• Drunkenness.