by Virginia Muwanigwa
Child sexual abuse and prostitution, which is prevalent in almost all the Southern African Development Community (SADC) countries, involves children of both sexes, as young as eight years old, who sell themselves for food or just to “survive”.
Although all SADC countries have ratified the Convention on the Rights of the Child, accepting the obligation to establish mechanisms for the protection of minors, children continue to be victims of rape within and outside the family structure, circumstances which force them into prostitution and general exploitation.
Punishment has not proven to be a good enough deterrent to child abuse. In Botswana, women are calling for rape to be made a capital offence but experience in other countries has shown the continued rape and defilement of minors. Women throughout the region are demanding gender-sensitive policies to deal with abuse not only of themselves but children, as currently the laws are inadequate.
The fact that members of the family are sometimes the culprits and are not likely to be reported also puts paid to deterrent sentences as the abuse seldom gets to attention of the authorities. A bizarre form of sexual abuse is that of fathers who sleep with their daughters as a form of “cleansing” or for good luck in business on the advice of some unscrupulous traditional healers. Dependency on men has also hindered some women from reporting cases of child abuse in the family sphere.
Parents have also been found to be forcing their children into prostitution in return for money and childcare workers warn of an impending crisis if nothing is done to curb these practises. Under-age girls are married off for lobola (brideprice) while some men are targeting young girls in fear of contracting HIV /AIDS from older women.
Against this background, civic education appears to be one effective preventative measure against child sexual abuse. “Aggressive awareness campaigns are a must and there is need to establish rape crisis centres, incest, abuse and sexual offence support groups that will provide education, counselling and support for victims.” say police in Malawi.
A paper prepared by the Zambian government for the World Congress Against the Commercial Sexual Exploitation of Children in Stockholm. Sweden, states that widespread and growing poverty. Decreased investments in social services, and a lack of mechanisms to assist families, communities and institutions to cope with global changes have compounded child abuse and the sexual exploitation of children.
“Girls are being raped and exploited just because they are girls” and “Children are also being exploited by people that they should be able to trust, such as relatives, teachers and community leaders.” reveals the report.
However, cases of sexual abuse of boys also exist in the region with reports of female child-minders who rape their charges. Some older women have also been reported to prey on boys whom they pay for sexual favours.
An estimated 400 000 Zambian children are vulnerable, orphaned or living off the streets while the community no longer provides the safe haven traditionally associated with it. “Sexual exploitation of children is Zambia’s silent problem. Poverty has gotten worse under the structural adjustment programme and is actually contributing to the problem.” says Scholastica Chinsense, deputy director of the Social Welfare department.
A study in Botswana by the Emang Basadi, a local women’s group, found out that rape cases have been increasing at a rate of five percent since 1982 and these include children. The Rape Crisis Centre in the country says that the Children’s Act needs to be amended to offer protection to victims whose statements should be taken in camera. Up until last year, children were questioned in the presence of many other people including the abusers and this tends to make them reluctant to speak.
Among some of the recommendations by the Women Activists’ Group, who are lobbying for the changing of socio-economic and political structures, is to ensure gender balance and empower women. The need for statutory definitions to govern the handling of sexual offences has also been highlighted.
In South Africa, the Mail and Guardia, a local weekly, reports that on the streets of the country’s major cities, children are exposed to shocking sexual abuse through prostitution. Against a background of ineffective controls by the Child Protection Unit (CPU) due to lack of capacity. children as young as eight are being abducted and forced into organised prostitution. “At present we have 900 cases with only 18 detectives in our unit. We have had some breakthroughs, like exposing the Internet site which advertised child prostitutes to tourists in Germany.” says Inspector Ernie Riedeman of CPU.
A workshop involving 18 organisations from the country met ahead of the international congress and agreed that the country is vulnerable to the infiltration of organisations which prey on children in countries affected by poverty and low levels of protection.
Some of the suggestions that have been made to protect children from abuse are: sensitising children to refuse to be lured to secluded places; teaching children that adults, including relatives should not fondle their private parts; students should desist from going to teachers’ houses; policies need to be put in place to ensure family unity; and making reporting places as victim-friendly as possible.
Protecting children from sexual abuse would be in line with Zambia’s observation that the region should “look at children’s development in a holistic manner, in a way that promotes their physical, spiritual, and psycho-social development — ~ well as their right to childhood”. (SARDC)
