A Non-Governmental Organisation (NGO), the Sexual and Gender-Based Violence Justice Network (SJN), has called for an upgrade of the Sexual Assault Referral Centre (SARC) in Enugu for effective justice delivery.
The programme, a one-day dialogue session, which was organised in Enugu Friday by SJN cluster with support from USAID
-Scale project, is aimed at providing speedy justice delivery to Sexual and Gender-Based Violence (SGBV) victims.
In his remarks, Chief Onyemuche Nnamani, the Chief Executive Officer of Auto Star Motors and member of the Police Service Commission Board, said he had a passion in the fight against SGBV, advising that people should start from their areas to protect the downtrodden in the society.
Nnamani stressed that people should fight sexual offences at all costs as it had eaten deep into the society, especially in people’s physiology.
He said that the fight against SGBV is everybody’s business as it does not cost money to protect people against it, hinting that it is a matter of determination.
Also speaking, the Chairperson, League of Women Voters, Enugu State chapter, Nnenna Anozie, said that the private sector was selected to see how it would assist the government in ensuring that the SARC was in a perfect working condition.
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Anozie, who is also a legal practitioner, said that justice delayed is justice denied, stressing “if the center functions well, victims would be eager to lodge their complains without fear or favour.”
She equally informed the public that abandoning one’s family because of hardship was a serious offence which could be reported in a court of law.
In a related development, the Permanent Secretary, Enugu State Ministry of Gender Affairs, Dr. Uzoamaka Okenwa, said the center should be a safe place for SGBV victims, but expressed regrets that the reverse is the case due to the non-functional facilities in the center.
Okenwa said that the main aim of setting up the center was to offer free medical services to SGBV victims, noting that the state government was doing its best to keep the place alive.
However, he said, the centre still needs collaboration from the private sector.
In the same vein, the Chairman, Nigeria Association of Women Journalist (NAWOJ), Enugu State Chapter, Ngozi Ngene, urged participants to intensify efforts on sensitisation as most people do not know that such a centre exists in the state.
Ngene explained that NAWOJ had taken its sensitisation programmes to many villages in the state, informing victims to always speak up when ever they are attacked.
Also speaking, the manager of SARC, Evelyn Onah, recommended that the centre should be established in each senatorial zone of the state for easy and speedy delivery of Justice.
Onah also complained that they need workers and other logistics to enable them take good care of victims, adding that most times the workers in the center would contribute their personal money to take care of the victims because of the passion they have for the job.