Ministry to come up with comprehensive procedure to help sexual, domestic violence victims

The Ministry of Welfare, Women and Community Wellbeing will come up with a comprehensive standard operating procedure (SOP) to assist sexually abused victims, especially children, and victims of domestic violence.

Its minister Datuk Fatimah Abdullah said they would come up with the comprehensive proposal soon before presenting it to Chief Minister Datuk Patinggi Tan Sri Adenan Satem.

“We are now fine-tuning the proposal. Once it’s completed, we will present it to the chief minister. The whole idea is to improve the current SOP so that we can assist the victims promptly and efficiently,” Fatimah said when contacted yesterday.

She added that her ministry would also come up with a hotline for victims of emergency cases.

“We have to improve the current SOP among the various agencies as well as within the agency concerned so that we can be more efficient, fast and accurate.”

Fatimah also advised parents and victims of sexual abuse not to conceal them but instead to report the matter promptly to the police so that the perpetrators could be dealt with according to the law.

“Very often, parents of the victims refused to lodge police reports knowing well the consequences that would befall the perpetrators. For instance, if the perpetrators are government servants, they will lose their jobs and pensions and so forth. So out of pity, they (parents and victims) wouldn’t report the matter to the police.

“But I want to strongly advise the parents and the victims that they must not take pity on the perpetrators. Instead, they must take pity on the victims who are experiencing the trauma,” Fatimah said.

She reckoned that there might be cases which were left unreported simply because the perpetrators were known to the victims and were perhaps even the relatives or parents of the victims.

When contacted, state CID chief Datuk Dev Kumar said that overall, there was a decline in the number of cases involving sexual abuse among children below 18, which could be classified into three categories namely, rape, outraging of modesty and sodomy.

However, there is a slight increase in the number of sodomy cases from four last year, to seven cases recorded in the first 10 months of this year. Among the seven reported sodomy cases this year one involved a victim below 18; one  below 16 and five involving those below 12 years old.

As for rape cases, there were 129 reported last year compared to 94 in the Jan till Oct 31period this year.

Last year, there were 15 reported cases involving children below 18, 99 cases involving victims below 16 and 15 cases involving victims below 12. In the first 10 months of this year 16 cases were reported involving children below 18, eight cases involving children below 16 and 13 cases involving children below 12.

For outraging of modesty, there were 40 cases reported last year and 33 in the first 10 months of this year – comprising eight cases involving victims below 16 and 25 cases involving children below 12.

The Child Act 2001 defines a ‘child’ as a person who is under the age of 18.

“Section 375 of the Penal Code makes it an offence for a man to have sexual intercourse with a child under 16 years of age with or without consent. It is onsidered as statutory rape,” he said.

Fatimah and Dev Kumar were commenting on a recent news report which quoted a Malacca Hospital gynaecologist Dr Maimunah Fadzil who revealed that at least three children were treated for sexual abuse at the facility every week.

She said the number usually rose during school holidays and festive periods, when children spent more time at home.

In most cases, Dr Mainumah said, children willingly fell into the trap. She added that many children had even become ‘addicted’ to being sexually abused.

She attributed the shockingly high statistics to lack of close parental supervision, as well as an alarming trend in children taking part in immoral activities performed by adults around them.

Source:
courtesy of THE BORNEO POST

by Peter Sibon

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