Firm punishment for child defilers

I recently attended the launch of a home for defiled minors supported by Ripples International in Kithoka, Meru County. The victims were defiled by their fathers, grandmothers, brothers, uncles and neighbours and infected with disease, impregnated, physically damaged and traumatised.

A German philanthropic group led by Natalie Worner, a former model, sponsored the home. It was emotive to see so many young mothers who themselves deserve motherly care.

But I was equally encouraged by their positive attitude to a life they have just started. A 12-year-old whose father repeatedly defiled her while in Standard Four tops in her Standard Five class.

Thanks to Ripples International, this child-mother and another 171 can have hope in life although it is disgusting that they have to live in a hostel and not at home with their parents as children should. It is equally nauseating that it takes foreign-funded NGOs to rebuild the lives of child victims of defilement when we have failed them.

The daily stories one reads on this subject are sickening; for example, that of a 10 year-old girl who was defiled by her father because the mother denied him sex; or of the 45-year-old man who defiled three children aged 3, 5 and 7, after luring them with biscuits.

This crime happens so repeatedly because it is rarely reported, while those reported are not prosecuted either because: the defiled and their parents withhold information because of the stigma of the crime. Some even withdraw court cases after being compromised by defilers and also due to poor prosecution. When prosecuted fines can be as low as Sh2,000 and jail sentences as short as a month.

Since we are the ones who have condemned our children to such wretchedness, we should fund their rehabilitation. We have to start by strengthening police units that address matters of defilement. If of sound mind, the guilty should receive the kind of punishment that would make potential offenders shiver at what could befall them, while police officers that fail to fully prosecute child defilers and parents who conceal the crime should be censured.

In some traditional African societies, child defilers were excommunicated from society, executed or castrated because they were considered no different from animals. In western society, they are named and shamed through listing in public data banks so that the public and especially neigbours keep off their company.

Ideally, victims of defilement should live in their respective communities with other children in families willing to accommodate them to experience a semblance of family life, not in boarding institutions. Such a programme should be Government financed and should target a full education and rehabilitation of defiled minors.

Meanwhile, the public should be sensitised on this social ill as potential partners in fighting the habit while departments of child protection should be strengthened through capacity building to carry out education of mothers who: are unwilling or shy to expose known defilers; send their children to the streets to prostitute to ease domestic poverty; and marry off their daughters to persons who have defiled them.

Given that some defilers may be suffering from depression or mental illnesses, they too need rehabilitation.

The writer is MP for Tigania West and Assistant Minister Higher Education, Science and Technology