Parents should cultivate the habit of being suspicious of everyone around their kids. The most trusted persons are usually the violators/perpetrators. Imagine stabbing you in the back; someone you trusted.
Be wary with in having male guests to stay over when you have girl-kids in the house.
Once you notice your kid exhibiting odd behaviour or you notice a change, don’t hesitate to start asking questions.
When you question your kid, don’t shout; you’ll end up scaring her. She’s already scared! So be kind.
I covered a story once where two pretty little sisters lived in a “face-me-I-face-you” compound. Their mum was outside Nigeria. They were staying with their aunt. I can’t recollect what happened to their mum. The aunt used to leave them at home with neighbours, to go to Trade Fair to sell noodles, eggs and tea.
The girls should be about four and six years; I can’t be sure for now. I still however remembered that they were quite pretty.
The eldest was the first to become sickly. Doctors however couldn’t understand what was wrong with her.
The aunt temporarily stopped her business. She started asking the girl repeatedly what was wrong with her. She wasn’t eating and was losing weight.
The aunt was shocked when the girl told her that she would die if she told her what was wrong with her.
It took gentle prodding and quizzing before the girl opened up. Yes, the caring uncle opposite their room, a widower, had been sexually molesting both sisters. He told them they would die if they tell their aunt.
It turned out that the man was a HIV carrier. His late wife died of AIDS. The kids were taken for laboratory test.
Back to my point; don’t shout, but be gently persistent. The situation now in our society has become so bizarre that even boy-kids need to be protected.
We have a running story now where a 25-year-old man lured his neighbour’s five-year-old boy into a room/bush and raped him through the anus until he was bleeding. The kid was rushed to hospital, where doctors battled to save him.
A boy that was about six years old suddenly had a swollen penis. His mum was bathing him when she noticed it. She asked what was wrong with him; he said his class mistress used to take him to the last floor of the school building to suckle his baby-penis.
The mistress, a mother of two, supposedly happily married, was arrested and taken to Area M Police Command, Idimu/Egbeda.
The boy was brought to my kids’ school. The parents felt he needed a change of scene. But shockingly, immediately the boy entered my kids’ school premises, he started shivering like he had palsy or something. Tears ran down his frightened face. He was choking on his tears. His mum asked what was the matter. He said: “She’ll take me to upstairs. I don’t want upstairs.”
With such heart-breaking cries, it was clear the kid had been traumatised beyond belief. Nobody knew how long the class teacher had been suckling his baby-penis.
Schools with upstairs now trigger bad memories for him. My kids’ school has a two storey building.
We should begin at a very tender age to teach our kids to confide in us. I’m a very busy person and my kids have only me, but I try as much as possible to ask them questions about their day at home and in school.
I ask them questions about what happened at school, exchanges that took place between them and our housemaid.
I have repeatedly told them to let me know if someone touches their penis or bum bum.
Being a person who had been serially violated, I’m extremely paranoid. I can’t help it. So, I watch my boys like hawk. It’s not only the girl-child that’s an endanger specie. Kids, in the whole world, are no longer safe from sexual predators. These predators are everywhere; right under our noses and eyes.
Our schools and homes are no longer safe havens. Even our churches and mosques. I went to the Lagos State Criminal Investigations Department, Panti, Yaba last year and one of my police friends told me that I just missed a story.
A Muslim cleric, teaching in an Islamic school, had sexually violated almost all the little girls in the school. The cleric had already been charged to court before I came.
I tried to get the story, but I later understood there was a sort of secrecy surrounding it. The school didn’t want the matter to be publicised. Publicity would mean losing pupils or school shut down.
I’m a tigress where my kids are concern. Let’s all be. A sexually violated kid or a raped one will never be like other kids.
Most importantly, believe your kids above any other person. Listen when your kids complain. Don’t shut them up even when you feel the “tales” sound wild.
It takes courage to be able to get over rape. But sometimes you ask yourself, “Am I really over it?”
Part of the courage is taking each day as it comes. Knowing that you’re in charge of your life and body. Knowing you can kick arses if someone tries to mess with your body.
For me, part of the courage is fighting, using my profession to expose the perpetrators of these crimes.
A raped victim is not to be blamed for being raped. Being pretty is not a crime. It’s a crime however for a guy to rape a lady and then tell her that he did it because he just couldn’t help himself because of her beauty.
What nonsense!
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