Showing posts with label Sexual Offences Bill. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Sexual Offences Bill. Show all posts

Saturday, January 28, 2017

The Shocking Rise Of Paedophilia In Nigeria

By Tony Ogunlowo
Hardly a day goes by when there isn’t a news report about a minor being sexually abused by a much older person. And the shocking thing is that for every case reported dozens are not because the young victims are either too scared of their attackers or embarrassed to talk to anyone. And it’s so bad now that it’s rising to epidemic levels and soon Nigeria will be overtaking Cambodia and the Far East as the paedophile hotspot of the world!

Currently the law stipulates life imprisonment for rape of a minor under the new Sexual Offences Bill but the law doesn’t deal with those who marry under-age girls to circumvent the law. Whilst it is a horrendous crime to rape anyone it’s even worse when the victim is a child and the perpetrator can get away with it by either marrying their victim or shutting them up. Most paedophiles get away with their crimes because they are much older and can intimidate or brainwash their victims. And most of the time the perpetrators of these crimes are people known to the victims as fathers, brothers, neighbours, uncles, in-laws etc.
Disturbingly, families are prepared to put up a wall of silence and pretend as if nothing is going wrong if there is a case of incest or paedophilia going on in their household. They all keep quiet, hoping it blow over, in an attempt to preserve their dignity often threatening the victim to remain quiet and not dealing with the perpertrator.
Some tribes even encourage paedophilia by marrying off their under-age daughters to men old enough to be their grandfathers. And over the years no government policy or law has been put in place to outlaw this practice until recently and it’s still not enforced. Our society needs to shape up; it’s not okay for a 50-year old to be seen walking down the road with his new under-age wife. It doesn’t matter if he’s the richest man in Nigeria, an Oba or Emir. It’s morally wrong and the person belongs in jail! And for those who disagree or hide behind the flimsy excuse of ‘it’s our tradition’, how would you feel if your under-age son or daughter was being sexually abused by a 50-year old? Some men even think it’s ‘cool’ to sleep with an under-age child. It’s not and anybody who sleeps with an under-aged child, whether it’s consensual or not, is a paedophile. On a sadder note thirty-five Nigerian Senators actually voted, recently, for the legalization of child marriage! And the Senators in question all happen to be from the North and Muslims! Somebody ought to tell them we live in the 21st century now and such barbaric acts are not tolerable despite what the Koran says about marriage.