The sad reality is that some of these incidents go unreported for a variety of reasons, either because the parents have been paid off or the family has chosen to protect the culprit at the expense of the child who was denied the right to innocence and play freely without a care in the world.
Two weeks back, we carried an article about a man from Gumare who defiled a 16-year-old boy from Shakawe, a despicable act, which is one of the many cases of defilement that occur across the country and sadly, most of these culprits know they will just get a slap on the wrist.
Paedophiles should be locked up and the keys, thrown as far away as possible, so that they do not do this to any other child. According to the laws of Botswana once found guilty of defilement, the perpetrator may get a minimum of 10 years or a maximum of life imprisonment. It is high time that we as a society come together to lobby government to increase the minimum and for the sentencing in these cases to be stiffer. Paedophiles should get the maximum sentence once found guilty.
We have long been promised a sex offender registry, which many saw as a welcome development, but just like many other progressive developments, implementation seems to be a problem. A school girl was raped on her way back from school in June, the culprit up to now has not been arrested. There are many other instances where young girls continue to be raped and it is now beginning to look like establishing a sex offender register was just paying lip service to action, meant to impress the international community.
Our children no longer feel safe, parents become paranoid each time their children leave home to go to school or anywhere else. Children no longer enjoy playing with others on the streets because some grown men have decided to terrorise young girls by either enticing them with money just to defile them or lurking in dark alleys to pounce on young girls. Rape is a traumatising experience and there can never be any excuse presented as to why the rape occurred. Even adults who have been raped before find it extremely difficult to cope with the trauma; now imagine a young girl or boy who has every right to enjoy their childhood and innocence without suffering any form of abuse from grown ups. Let us clean our streets and house, our children develop to enjoy the innocence that comes with being a child without wolves waiting to devour them.
