Ovie Omo-Agege, deputy senate
president, says under the proposed sexual harassment prohibition law, students
of tertiary institutions will be treated as minors.
Speaking at a policy dialogue
organised by Youth Alive Foundation (YAF), a non-governmental organisation
(NGO), in Abuja on Monday, Omo-Agege said a lecturer could face statutory rape
charges even if a student gives consent.
The proposed law was reintroduced
in the senate in October in the wake of a documentary exposing sexual assaults
in West African universities by the BBC Africa Eye.
The deputy senate president said
they were able to make students minors “because of that special relationship of
trust and dependency that exist between the lecturer or the educator and the
student”.
“What we are trying to achieve
now is make sure that we also treat these university students, polytechnic or
college of education students – we want to treat all of them as if they are
minors making it statutory rape,” he said.
“There has to be a basis for that
and we have been able to make the case for that. The reason why we can make
them minors is because we have seen that they are incapable of giving consent
because of that special relationship of trust and dependency that exist between
the lecturer or the educator and the student.
“That deprives them of great
legal capacity to voluntarily consent to having that sexual relationship. As is
it right now, there is no special provision dealing with these category of
victims other than the general law regulating rape.”
Omo-Agege said it will be
difficult to prove rape allegations going by the general provisions of the
laws.
“If we leave them to the general
provisions regulating rape, it will be difficult for prosecutors to prove an
offence of rape,” he said.
Udy Okon, YAF executive director,
said sexual harassment is an important issue that must be addressed in society.
“We have accepted it as a norm.
It is not the ideal situation where girls are abused,” Okon said.
She said her organisation will
continue to put the issue on the front burner.
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