This sudden noise about the cases of rape in Nigeria keeps me wondering as if it is just one strange event in isolation. Rape is just one out of the symptoms of the rots in our system. Crimes come in clusters.
Besides, it is not just happening today. It has always been with us albeit it might have just be in sudden rise in the recent time.
The Yoruba literature book I read in Junior school in the early 90's narrated a scene of serial rape collectively planned by some boys with a girl.
There are many serial crimes of human against human in Nigeria that ought to have been drawing hot tears from our collectives eyes. Rape is just one and looking for a solution for it in isolation is just a misjudgement of the mess we find ourselves. The solution for rape is no less than that for the entire root causes of all the criminal acts in Nigeria.
In the rising daily reports of failures of the Nigerian state, we can only see rape as just being brazingly added to the catalogue of daylight robberies bedeviling our nation.
We had come to term with the daylight robberies of national resources by political office holders at all levels; The corruption of cash and asset raping people of their future.
What of raping people of their human rights at the topmost level of decision-making in the government; The corruption of laws and justice?
What of rape of trust and belief in our Houses of God; The corruption of commercialization of religion and fake annual prophesies?
Have we not been raped of freedom and security through kidnapping for ransom?
What of theft of
personal hard-earned money and belonging in our homes and on the roads by both the officers and offenders?
Now the daylight robbery of our body and dignity has just been added. The theft of rape and sexual assaults!
While our dear Nigeria may not be rivalled in the world for the award of the first runner up in all the catalogues of the socio-economic rapes I have mentioned, I felt glad to know that Nigeria is not in the year 2020 list of the countries identified for rape of sexual assault in the world even when South Africa tops the global list and other neighbouring African countries are prominently featured.
You can read the article in this link
worldpopulationreview.com/countries/rape-statistics-by-country
From this statistics, women between ages 16-19 are four times more likely to be victims and college students of ages 18-24 are three more times at the risk.
Ladies in this categories range from those in the terminal secondary school classes, to undergraduate or fresh graduates. Simply, the adolescents, matured women who are just barely in their marriageable ages.
Judging from this statistics, reported cases of rape in the country (if not under reported) is not yet high to deserve global indexing. The Nigerian state must therefore do everything possible to maintain the clean record and stem the evils. There must be proactive measures on the following:
1. Dressing in the Public
Animals are not made to have self restraint. Indecent dressing is potentially capable of inducing the urge to forcefully have it with the provocatively-dressed at that moment or sometimes later by these rapists. If unable, such sexual temptation can lead them to other women given any available opportunity, even if that victim at that moment is well dressed, a toddler or their relative. We can not undervalue the residual long-term effect of corruption induced by bad dressing on the sick minds.
It sad that those who should be guilty of their immoral dressing are using the raped lady in hijab to push an argument that dressing cannot be a catalyst to rape. Immoral dressing and nude pictures certainly have their role.
The female teachers, lecturers and public figures should begin to see that decency of the mind begins from decency of appearance. God hates immorality and gave clothes to cover, not to show shapes and reveal contours. Covering is preservation, purity and protection.
We cannot draw similitude with the dressing in the white man's lands. White men have effective law and working system that can compel restraints. We have none. Besides, what is indecent to us is a culture to the whites. They grow with it. Their men and women going to public places in shorts is a way of life. It is alien to us. Wherever it is found in Africa, it is imported as we imported COVID-19.
Leaving out the ugly scenes of the slave trade, Africans have the highest sense of dignity and modesty. It would be foolish and counter-productive if our women have to go in the way of minis and pants.
A contrast can be made of the dressing in the South African women and their ranking as the topmost in rape cases in the world. Perhaps some level of decency in dressing in Nigeria is still helping. We must intensify to sustain and win.
2. Regulation in movie industries and television shows
The minds are connected to sights. Nigerian films are guilty of nude scenes. Immoral TV shows like BB Naija should be banned. Bad songs and the so-called spoilt celebrities that promote licentiousness also contribute. Because of the jobless nature of the majority, these channels are means of pastimes and relaxations. When these youths who are mostly singles and sexually active watch and get seduced, they are desperate to practice what they watch with any lady they can get, forcefully or negotiably. Sometimes, they defile minors in the neighbourhood. The first stop to a crime is blocking the path to temptation. It may be sensational to say these ideas of rape and other criminalities are inspired from our entertainment industries. Serious government cannot pretend not to see or know.
3. Parental Presence
Parents are no longer in charge of their homes. Children are pseudo-guided by strangers such as phones (where they learn what is unknown to adult and far beyond their need), peers (who have same juvenile problems and equally have phones), schools (which are strictly business ventures) and neighbours (who are unkind, deceptive, spoilt and greedy).
When the minds of children wander around, they get occupied with whatever thoughts they find. Parents should be more watchful, careful and mindful of what their children wear, watch, want and wish. Who they walk with and where they while away their time are very important.
Leaving the girls in the custody of men should bother them. According to statistics in the above link, 70% of rapists in US are known to their victims.
Access to phone through which these children travel and get loss in the wilderness of the social media with pornography, dating sites and engage in sensuous chats with strange men should be put to check. Prayer too is no second option. Day and night, parents must keep praying for their dependents.
They should know that when the thought of taking their children to someone else to pray for comes up, they have already failed the children and the children are beginning to fail them.
4. Engaging The Youths
The grown adolescents are sexually matured. Like a flower just sprouting up, the urge for sex is heighting. There is need to engage them with something to get them busy such as skill acquisition with proper monitoring. Session of religious and moral education theming around the need to be patient for sex, restraining the temptation, virtue of chastity and joy of the day of marriage must be frequent. An idle hand is a devil's workshop
5. Reformation of Religious Houses and Teaching
Whether anyone likes it or not, Nigeria is not a secular state. Secular states recognize religion but it has no mention in the affairs of state. Religion is an integral part of Nigeria. In fact, it is our foremost identity.
Official meetings in public institutions start and end with religious prayer shared between followers of the two prominent faiths. This practice is unnecessary and a waste of time. This does not happen in secular country.
They settle strictly for business leaving anyone with decision to pray according to his faith, if he likes. They end up with decisive resolution devoid of sense of greeds and hypocrisy of our own prayer-warriors. Anyway, it is an indicator that our nation is non-secular.
Through religion, our political leaders are permutated, regions are identified and national holidays are shared. There are national religious houses and appointed religious leaders in the seat of government.
Sadly, religious ministries have been grossly marred with corruption. Rather than being a spring of guidance to our society, the so-called religious leaders are models of every evil bedeviling Nigeria. Many of them have been accused of all sort of corruption and indecent acts including rape! Many have been caught with ritual killings.
Fear of God is no longer in the minds of most people either by virtue of the bad examples of these impostors or their promise to provide them with spiritual coverage or ritual support. If religious leaders can lie, commit theft and even rape, then who else can't?
6. Correct Awareness and Re-orientation
The world is into rituals for money or powers. Many rapists act under the false belief that having canal knowledge of a woman is an easiest way to get such. Perhaps, it accounts for the reason, they had gone beyond just raping to murdering their victim. It may be power or money connected.
I heard of a myth that having sex with a virgin is a cure for HIV. This is a satanic impression. The media should engage the society in serious awareness and orientation to correct these evil notions.
Besides, there is also a need for reorientation on what is nudity. A woman is entirely nude. Showing breast side or mid-line between the boobs is nudity. It is sad that brides are even nude in their wedding gowns today. It is immoral for a woman to look at the nudity of another woman just as it from men to men like him. The rising tide of same sex order is enough to activate our senses to potential dangers inherent in such reckless attitude.
These evil actions happen in schools' hostels and in many homes between fathers and male children or mothers and her daughters. A man or woman walks out of the bathroom naked because he or she is in the midst of the same genders.
Same genders can flirt with each other. If same sex no longer works, it can be forced sex. It must stop.
7. Support for marriage
Marriage is an institution of God. It is either allowed, encouraged and supported for our grown ups in these categories or we sacrifice them to temptations. Marriage protects women. It restrains men and finally reduce sexual immoralities in the society.
Indifference to dating, encouraging boyfriends and opposition to marriage in the contemporary society is self-destructive. It deviates from the practice known for maintaining decency and sexual purity in the typical old African society. Modernity is fast ruining our dignifying practices, cultural heritage and value systems.
It is either one gets money to sponsor and support marriage or find one to bail him if guilty of sexual assaults; and if a lady, file suit to fight her case or take care of her unwanted pregnancy. Marriage is one vital option to stem all temptations to sexual-related vices. Rape is a complex version of such vices. It is not good to treat it in isolation.
8. Firm Purnitive Law and Execution
The problem of our nation is the lack of wills to uphold laws. Or can I say selective or subjective application of law? Laws, when applied in the way it respects no one, society is restored to normalcy.
A rapist is a robber, terrorist and fornicator. He has committed a theft using sexual intercourse as a weapon. When a thief steals, the hand with which he steals should be cut to deter others. Nigeria led her way to crimes of every kind when capital punishment are considered itself too harsh for violators of the law of the land. When the armed-robbers are fired to be watched live on the national TV in the 80's, the nation was more decent and sane.
Today, kidnappers, corrupt politicians and even rapists can hire lawyers, bribe judges and make rubbish of justice. Nations do not pay lipservice to execution of the law of the land no matter whose ox is gored.
The debate about the right punitive measure against the rapist have started in our national assemblies already. No surprise! The religious and political leaders themselves also belong to the gang of rapist! Some of them are facing such charges of sexual assaults.
Straight in my consideration, the rapist should be castrated. Whoever has greedily licked hot soup without consent does not deserve to have a tongue to taste once again.
For the unlawful sexual intercourse, he should be stoned to death if married. If unmarried, he should be flogged 100 lashes and banished from the society for one year.
More so, for forcing the victim against her consent, he should pay a certain huge amount of compensation to the victim. Finally, if the victim dies as a result of the act, he should also pay in addition, blood money to her families.
These punishments are severe. The circumstance of rape is no less severe a trauma. Many of the victims may no longer be normal for the rest of their lives.
May God Almighty save us and deliver our society.
Besides, it is not just happening today. It has always been with us albeit it might have just be in sudden rise in the recent time.
The Yoruba literature book I read in Junior school in the early 90's narrated a scene of serial rape collectively planned by some boys with a girl.
There are many serial crimes of human against human in Nigeria that ought to have been drawing hot tears from our collectives eyes. Rape is just one and looking for a solution for it in isolation is just a misjudgement of the mess we find ourselves. The solution for rape is no less than that for the entire root causes of all the criminal acts in Nigeria.
In the rising daily reports of failures of the Nigerian state, we can only see rape as just being brazingly added to the catalogue of daylight robberies bedeviling our nation.
We had come to term with the daylight robberies of national resources by political office holders at all levels; The corruption of cash and asset raping people of their future.
What of raping people of their human rights at the topmost level of decision-making in the government; The corruption of laws and justice?
What of rape of trust and belief in our Houses of God; The corruption of commercialization of religion and fake annual prophesies?
Have we not been raped of freedom and security through kidnapping for ransom?
What of theft of
personal hard-earned money and belonging in our homes and on the roads by both the officers and offenders?
Now the daylight robbery of our body and dignity has just been added. The theft of rape and sexual assaults!
While our dear Nigeria may not be rivalled in the world for the award of the first runner up in all the catalogues of the socio-economic rapes I have mentioned, I felt glad to know that Nigeria is not in the year 2020 list of the countries identified for rape of sexual assault in the world even when South Africa tops the global list and other neighbouring African countries are prominently featured.
You can read the article in this link
worldpopulationreview.com/countries/rape-statistics-by-country
From this statistics, women between ages 16-19 are four times more likely to be victims and college students of ages 18-24 are three more times at the risk.
Ladies in this categories range from those in the terminal secondary school classes, to undergraduate or fresh graduates. Simply, the adolescents, matured women who are just barely in their marriageable ages.
Judging from this statistics, reported cases of rape in the country (if not under reported) is not yet high to deserve global indexing. The Nigerian state must therefore do everything possible to maintain the clean record and stem the evils. There must be proactive measures on the following:
1. Dressing in the Public
Animals are not made to have self restraint. Indecent dressing is potentially capable of inducing the urge to forcefully have it with the provocatively-dressed at that moment or sometimes later by these rapists. If unable, such sexual temptation can lead them to other women given any available opportunity, even if that victim at that moment is well dressed, a toddler or their relative. We can not undervalue the residual long-term effect of corruption induced by bad dressing on the sick minds.
It sad that those who should be guilty of their immoral dressing are using the raped lady in hijab to push an argument that dressing cannot be a catalyst to rape. Immoral dressing and nude pictures certainly have their role.
The female teachers, lecturers and public figures should begin to see that decency of the mind begins from decency of appearance. God hates immorality and gave clothes to cover, not to show shapes and reveal contours. Covering is preservation, purity and protection.
We cannot draw similitude with the dressing in the white man's lands. White men have effective law and working system that can compel restraints. We have none. Besides, what is indecent to us is a culture to the whites. They grow with it. Their men and women going to public places in shorts is a way of life. It is alien to us. Wherever it is found in Africa, it is imported as we imported COVID-19.
Leaving out the ugly scenes of the slave trade, Africans have the highest sense of dignity and modesty. It would be foolish and counter-productive if our women have to go in the way of minis and pants.
A contrast can be made of the dressing in the South African women and their ranking as the topmost in rape cases in the world. Perhaps some level of decency in dressing in Nigeria is still helping. We must intensify to sustain and win.
2. Regulation in movie industries and television shows
The minds are connected to sights. Nigerian films are guilty of nude scenes. Immoral TV shows like BB Naija should be banned. Bad songs and the so-called spoilt celebrities that promote licentiousness also contribute. Because of the jobless nature of the majority, these channels are means of pastimes and relaxations. When these youths who are mostly singles and sexually active watch and get seduced, they are desperate to practice what they watch with any lady they can get, forcefully or negotiably. Sometimes, they defile minors in the neighbourhood. The first stop to a crime is blocking the path to temptation. It may be sensational to say these ideas of rape and other criminalities are inspired from our entertainment industries. Serious government cannot pretend not to see or know.
3. Parental Presence
Parents are no longer in charge of their homes. Children are pseudo-guided by strangers such as phones (where they learn what is unknown to adult and far beyond their need), peers (who have same juvenile problems and equally have phones), schools (which are strictly business ventures) and neighbours (who are unkind, deceptive, spoilt and greedy).
When the minds of children wander around, they get occupied with whatever thoughts they find. Parents should be more watchful, careful and mindful of what their children wear, watch, want and wish. Who they walk with and where they while away their time are very important.
Leaving the girls in the custody of men should bother them. According to statistics in the above link, 70% of rapists in US are known to their victims.
Access to phone through which these children travel and get loss in the wilderness of the social media with pornography, dating sites and engage in sensuous chats with strange men should be put to check. Prayer too is no second option. Day and night, parents must keep praying for their dependents.
They should know that when the thought of taking their children to someone else to pray for comes up, they have already failed the children and the children are beginning to fail them.
4. Engaging The Youths
The grown adolescents are sexually matured. Like a flower just sprouting up, the urge for sex is heighting. There is need to engage them with something to get them busy such as skill acquisition with proper monitoring. Session of religious and moral education theming around the need to be patient for sex, restraining the temptation, virtue of chastity and joy of the day of marriage must be frequent. An idle hand is a devil's workshop
5. Reformation of Religious Houses and Teaching
Whether anyone likes it or not, Nigeria is not a secular state. Secular states recognize religion but it has no mention in the affairs of state. Religion is an integral part of Nigeria. In fact, it is our foremost identity.
Official meetings in public institutions start and end with religious prayer shared between followers of the two prominent faiths. This practice is unnecessary and a waste of time. This does not happen in secular country.
They settle strictly for business leaving anyone with decision to pray according to his faith, if he likes. They end up with decisive resolution devoid of sense of greeds and hypocrisy of our own prayer-warriors. Anyway, it is an indicator that our nation is non-secular.
Through religion, our political leaders are permutated, regions are identified and national holidays are shared. There are national religious houses and appointed religious leaders in the seat of government.
Sadly, religious ministries have been grossly marred with corruption. Rather than being a spring of guidance to our society, the so-called religious leaders are models of every evil bedeviling Nigeria. Many of them have been accused of all sort of corruption and indecent acts including rape! Many have been caught with ritual killings.
Fear of God is no longer in the minds of most people either by virtue of the bad examples of these impostors or their promise to provide them with spiritual coverage or ritual support. If religious leaders can lie, commit theft and even rape, then who else can't?
6. Correct Awareness and Re-orientation
The world is into rituals for money or powers. Many rapists act under the false belief that having canal knowledge of a woman is an easiest way to get such. Perhaps, it accounts for the reason, they had gone beyond just raping to murdering their victim. It may be power or money connected.
I heard of a myth that having sex with a virgin is a cure for HIV. This is a satanic impression. The media should engage the society in serious awareness and orientation to correct these evil notions.
Besides, there is also a need for reorientation on what is nudity. A woman is entirely nude. Showing breast side or mid-line between the boobs is nudity. It is sad that brides are even nude in their wedding gowns today. It is immoral for a woman to look at the nudity of another woman just as it from men to men like him. The rising tide of same sex order is enough to activate our senses to potential dangers inherent in such reckless attitude.
These evil actions happen in schools' hostels and in many homes between fathers and male children or mothers and her daughters. A man or woman walks out of the bathroom naked because he or she is in the midst of the same genders.
Same genders can flirt with each other. If same sex no longer works, it can be forced sex. It must stop.
7. Support for marriage
Marriage is an institution of God. It is either allowed, encouraged and supported for our grown ups in these categories or we sacrifice them to temptations. Marriage protects women. It restrains men and finally reduce sexual immoralities in the society.
Indifference to dating, encouraging boyfriends and opposition to marriage in the contemporary society is self-destructive. It deviates from the practice known for maintaining decency and sexual purity in the typical old African society. Modernity is fast ruining our dignifying practices, cultural heritage and value systems.
It is either one gets money to sponsor and support marriage or find one to bail him if guilty of sexual assaults; and if a lady, file suit to fight her case or take care of her unwanted pregnancy. Marriage is one vital option to stem all temptations to sexual-related vices. Rape is a complex version of such vices. It is not good to treat it in isolation.
8. Firm Purnitive Law and Execution
The problem of our nation is the lack of wills to uphold laws. Or can I say selective or subjective application of law? Laws, when applied in the way it respects no one, society is restored to normalcy.
A rapist is a robber, terrorist and fornicator. He has committed a theft using sexual intercourse as a weapon. When a thief steals, the hand with which he steals should be cut to deter others. Nigeria led her way to crimes of every kind when capital punishment are considered itself too harsh for violators of the law of the land. When the armed-robbers are fired to be watched live on the national TV in the 80's, the nation was more decent and sane.
Today, kidnappers, corrupt politicians and even rapists can hire lawyers, bribe judges and make rubbish of justice. Nations do not pay lipservice to execution of the law of the land no matter whose ox is gored.
The debate about the right punitive measure against the rapist have started in our national assemblies already. No surprise! The religious and political leaders themselves also belong to the gang of rapist! Some of them are facing such charges of sexual assaults.
Straight in my consideration, the rapist should be castrated. Whoever has greedily licked hot soup without consent does not deserve to have a tongue to taste once again.
For the unlawful sexual intercourse, he should be stoned to death if married. If unmarried, he should be flogged 100 lashes and banished from the society for one year.
More so, for forcing the victim against her consent, he should pay a certain huge amount of compensation to the victim. Finally, if the victim dies as a result of the act, he should also pay in addition, blood money to her families.
These punishments are severe. The circumstance of rape is no less severe a trauma. Many of the victims may no longer be normal for the rest of their lives.
May God Almighty save us and deliver our society.
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