Any day I woke to the scorching news of rape or pedophilia, I lose interest in doing anything, simply because the society has made laws with sharpened teeth but won’t allow it to bite incessant occurrence and reoccurrence of sexual assaults and sexual abuse on children.

According to Merriam Webster and other English Dictionaries, rape is the unlawful sexual intercourse or any other sexual penetration of the vagina, anus, or mouth of another person, with or without force, by a sex organ, other body part, or foreign object, without the consent of the victim while pedophilia— a feeling of sexual attraction to children, is a psychiatric disorder in which an adult or older adolescent experiences a primary or exclusive sexual attraction to prepubescent children according to Diagnostic and Statistical manual of Mental Disorders. This includes fingering and sharing of erotic materials with prepubescent children.

Though the Penal Code applicable in all the states in Northern Nigeria allows sex with a pubescent girl at age 14, it’s important to note that the most conventional worldwide is18 and must be with the consent of the person involved.

These incessant cases are sardonic and the worst problem is lack of special courts to handle these cases and implementation of strict laws on affluent people found guilty of such acts.

Paedophilia which is synonymous to rape or that can lead to rape, causes a lot of damage to the opposite sex like health defect, death, cut of the vagina for the females and the likes of these vices.

I personally don’t think that there’s a punishment better than death by hanging or life imprisonment for anyone sexually assaulting underage children.

Though there is rape in same-sex (lesbian or gay) and legal or traditional marriages, it is not rampant. These however made some lenient groups to attempt grouping rape into legitimate which is intimate partner rape and real or illegitimate rape. In any case, whether date rape, courtship rape, intimate partner rape or distant partner rapes, all rapes are real rapes and criminal regardless of condition or circumstances.

Rape/Phedophilia victims are mostly covered because of the disdainful look and isolation they got afterwards. They believe if the case is not covered up, the victim might face a lot of challenges in her present and future life and of course justice might not prevail. Furthermore, the society finds it difficult to bring those who engage in pedophilia to book as they maybe of the elite class and thus immune as the can manipulate the courts.

A lot of reasons actually trigger rape and pedophilia, some are caused by the victims or the environment they find themselves. Indecent dressing is one of the causes though there is freedom of lifestyle; but some certain parts of the body attract people of either opposite or from the same sex.

Drug/alcohol addicts are the ones mostly engaged in rape because they are not in their right senses and since laws laid are lax in a country where social inequalities are rampant, they work freely after their evil acts.

Access to pornography or erotic materials by young children and adolescents is another curse on this generation that ignites rape and sexual assault on children. Lack of sex education, cultural silence and cultural beliefs are not left out as well as the way children are rebuked or corrected by parents or neighbours when caught in such acts.

To the best of my knowledge sex education is one of the best ways to end rape and pedophilia. This responsibility is not only on government, teachers and parents but the media, civil society organisations and religious leaders.

–– Lawal Sofiyyat Bolanle, Usmanu Danfodiyo University, Sokoto