Recent reports have it that a state in the South-Western part of Nigeria in recent times has recorded one of the highest cases of rape and other sexual offenses.
Just as the preponderance of rape and other gender based violence are eliciting concern among security agencies and gender movements across the country, facts are beginning to emerge on why the menace that is debasing womanhood are on the upward swing, despite much legislation put in place to check the scourge.
Ekiti state is no exception, as the crime ranks among the highest in the state. Alberto Adeyemi, Police Public Relations Officer in the state, told Vanguard that from January this year to October alone, 29 rape cases and defilement of under-aged have been recorded. He added that all the offenders had been charged to court, yet none of them has been sentenced.
A situation, the feminist movement in the state described as not only worrisome but dangerous. Ekiti prides itself as one of the states in the federation with laws that protect women and children from all forms of abuse.
As far back as 2011, the state had enacted gender-based violence prohibition law to complement the already existing laws that prescribed a minimum of 7 years to a life sentence for offenders.
Despite the stringent laws, it beats the imagination of many in the state that the obnoxious crime still remains very rife. At a public lecture organised by the Women and Children Development and Health Research Initiative (WCDHRI) in Ado Ekiti recently, experts and security agents identified reasons why offenders still prowl the streets seeking for preys, while their victims still suffer psychological trauma in silence.
To Adeyemi, the Police Public Relation Officer, victims are not helping matters, some for fear of stigmatization, preferred to keep quiet, while some would appeal to the Police to withdraw the matter midway, because of intervention from some quarters.
According to the Chairperson of International Federation of Women Lawyers in the state, Mrs. Rita Ilevbare, “it is very common to see perpetrators using traditional rulers, religious leaders, community leaders and influential people in the society to beg the victim and her family not to prosecute offenders.”