It’s
becoming the norm
The story of the robbery and rape of young secondary
school girls on a journey from Enugu to Lagos in Nigeria had me seriously upset
that when I was asked to comment on the need for justice I could only lament
the circumstances that allowed for such heinous crimes to take place without prospect
of punishment or justice.
I am almost becoming inured to tales of apparently marauding;
sex-starved savages whose sighting of damsels automatically sets in motion the impunity
and ferocity of rape without consequence, in our universities or now on our
roads and any other place when women might find themselves vulnerable to the
uncontrolled lusts of evil men.
There are too many issues related to this matter that
needs addressing but I will concentrate on more general points with the view to
preventing the recurrence of such tragedies.
Excuses and
many
Ekene Dili Chukwu Transport Company Limited, has been
in this business for the better part of four decades or more, I cannot
understand how having been chartered by a school to convey vulnerable girls
they allowed for this journey to commence without adequate support that the
poor girls were left exposed and open to prey in the middle of nowhere at
almost midnight.
Whilst, I read that the transport company suggests
that they were under duress [Vanguard
Nigeria] to deliver the kids that night, there are many other aspects to
the tale that show that the company, its staff and arrangements are
lackadaisical, irresponsible and without due preparation and concern.
They had completed more than 80% of the journey before
the bus broke down in another version of the saga [Punch
Nigeria] which has one question the road-worthiness of a bus that could not
complete a journey of less than 600 kilometres and I hope that features in
charges of neglect, recklessness and lack of care and attention to minors that
should be preferred against the company, first exacted in the arrest of the
driver of the bus.
Convoys are
a solution
Considering the security situation of Nigeria and the
notoriety of highwaymen on those roads, I am surprised that a company with that
length of experience had not adopted the use of mass convoys in travelling
between the East and West of Nigeria.
It would have been an easy arrangement to have a
convoy of probably 10 buses leave at set times of the day, all in radio contact
with each other with contingency. By which I mean, if any of the buses ran into
difficulty, the others can be quickly alerted and vulnerable passengers
immediately taken to safety.
The other usefulness of convoys means that scale can
allow for escorts either by licensed security agents or the police, ensuring
that passengers do not fall easy prey to opportunistic attacks.
Camping
stops at dusk
I was also told these buses rarely travel at night and
whilst this might have been an exception due to all sorts of extenuating
circumstances, it is not beyond Ekene Dili Chukwu Transport Company Limited to
have setup camping stops to accommodate passengers, especially vulnerable ones
as dusk sets in, with information of the progress of the journey relayed to the
destination to allay the fears of parents, guardians and relations.
In my view, none of this is rocket science, there is
nothing unique about convoys and Nigeria presents the conditions, situation and
setting for using convoys, security and camping stop motels to avoid the daring
and reckless exposure of vulnerable passengers to menace.
Processing
rape
One of the victims of this sad tale offered in rather
graphic detail information of how she avoided getting raped as the police
vehemently deny that any of the girls were sexually harassed apart from being
robbed.
I can well understand that societal stigma of rape but
the girls are twice abused if they are not provided psychological and
counselling support after their trauma as parents hope the passage of time
might heal the scars.
We need to realise that there are benefits to therapy
and need to begin to avail ourselves of that professional service. Denial is no
medicine for trauma, just as we need to be better educated about the need for
extended support systems that do not castigate, judge or condemn victims for
situations they could not have avoided.
Justice must
matter
Basically, nobody is helped by obfuscating the truth
because it means the criminals will not be adequately charged for their crimes
and the girls will hardly have obtained the required and needed justice that
appears to elude many rape victims in Nigeria.
Difficult as the subject of rape might seem, it needs
to be addressed without scruples and dealt with sympathetically on the part of
the victim and without mercy on the part of proven rapists and accomplices who
could have prevented the situation but tolerated and condoned it.
The least that can be done to restore the honour and
dignity of these girls is to prosecute their assailants to the fullest extent
of the law whilst ensuring that Ekene Dili Chukwu Transport Company Limited is
no way exculpated for allowing such vulnerable passengers to fall prey to such
unforgivably atrocious circumstances.
Sources
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