A non-governmental organisation, Women’s Rights and Health Project, WRAHP, said the number of reported cases of sexual violence has increased in Lagos State as a result of the level of awareness of its people.
The organisation made this known on Wednesday at a town hall meeting held at Alimosho local government hall to sensitise the people of the community with the aim of stemming the increasing rate of sexual violence.
Present at the event were community leaders, women and youths.
According to the Admin/Centre Assistant of WRAHP, Mrs. Nneoma Ezuma, the meeting was informed by the increasing number of cases of rape, defilement, assault and other vices received from the community and the need to stem them.
She said the effort of the European Union funded Rule of Law and Anti-corruption (ROLAC) programme managed by the British Council in Nigeria was to educate women, youths, community leaders on how to report and what to do when cases of sexual violence happened in their communities.
She said: “We are in the community to senitise women, youths and community leaders on how to tackle the issues of sexual and gender-based violence scourge and increase reporting cases of sexual violence in Alimosho community.
“We are here to educate people to speak up in order to arrest the perpetrators of the act, we would also work with the victims through the court free of charge. We want to ensure that those who commit the crime do not to go scot free, we also want to make the victims understand that what might have happened to them is not the end of life. We want such a victim to know that they could still become who they wanted to be in life.
“We have recorded alarming rate of rape cases and other vices about women and children in Alimosho as whole. One of the strategic ways to increase the awareness about the scourge is through town hall meeting which is what we are having here. We are going round all the local government and local council development area in Alimosho to educate the youths, community leaders, women and young girls to report case of sexual violence on time and to the appropriate authority for prompt action.
“Whenever there is any case of sexual violence they can easily report to us at Ireti House, which is why we are having the town hall meeting with them. As an organisation we want to reduce sexual violence, we are working with the members of the community to let them know the danger associated with it if they don’t report to the appropriate authority.”
She further said the organisation was identifying priority areas and following up on cases.
She said they had since January 2020 been working with members of the community with series of engagements and town hall meetings.
“We want to eliminate cases of gender-based violence such as rape, child defilement, sexual assaults, battery and other gender-based violence completely from the community. Through engagements we have discovered that victims and parents are afraid to come and report cases of gender-based violence, but through series of advocacy they would change and report to the appropriate authority.
“Even with some parents reporting, there are many cases going on unreported. That is why we are intensifying our efforts to ensure that we reach everybody. So, by empowering them with knowledge, they would be able to speak up and stop arbitrary settlement.
“In the past five years Alimosho has reported the highest number of cases of sexual violence in Lagos. You can ascribe it to number of cases, you can also ascribe it to level of awareness. We have increased the level of awareness. At the initial stage people didn’t know where to turn to, even when they go to the police, they don’t get what they want. But through our centre, they are getting justice and more informed and educated about gender based violence in the community.”
Meanwhile, some of the participants at the meeting thanked the organiser for creating the awareness on gender-based violence in the community and the state in general.
Mrs. Adefolake Fashina thanked the organiser for the training and promised to go out and educate girls about the danger associated with rape and other sexual related crimes.
Miss. Boluwatife Akinyemi said she had never been violated sexually, but she had learnt a lot from the training.
