Men urged to leave young girls alone

Maoka Junior Secondary School student Olorato Paseko brought the Avani Hotel conference room to a standstill this week when she loudly warned old men to leave young girls to study and stop seeing them as sex objects.

She said this at the Day of the African Child breakfast meeting in Gaborone under the theme ‘Engaging men and boys to accelerate prevention of sexual exploitation and abuse of children.’ Paseko spoke unapologetically, using both Setswana and English, to send the message home. “Borra, tlogelang makgela a butswe. Old men should stop thinking they can buy our precious bodies with a chocolate,” she said to the applause of attendants.

The teenager said that women are pillars of strength in the society and should be respected. If society however continues to empower women and girls only, violence against women will not stop. She also spoke against a patriarchial society, saying it silences women and diminishes them into nobodies.

“Where women are oppressed, you will have a young girl made to keep quiet and called a liar after being raped by her uncle,” she said. Another secondary student from Sir Seretse Khama Memorial School, Cosmos Mamaloukous said the challenge with the boy child is that he is expected to ‘man-up’ and that growing up, boys are made to play with guns while the girl-child gets dolls. He said this instills the belief that boys are strong and powerful.

He also said that the media also plays a role in influencing sexual violence. “We see rappers like 50 Cent throwing money at strippers, which undermines the latter as sex objects,” he said, adding that boys watch porn which further manipulates them into thinking women are sex tools. Mamaloukous urged parents to be involved in the upbringing of their children and to have open and honest communication with them on sexuality.

According to a survey on Youth Risk Behaviour undertaken by the Ministry of Education and CDC last year, one in five teenagers have had sex. One in three had sex before they were 13 years old, 13 percent had exchanged sex for money, drugs or gifts and one in five were forced to have sex in the last 12 months.

UNICEF Country representative Julianna Lindsey said that sexual abuse and exploitation costs Botswana money as more is spent on health services, social welfare services, counseling, among others to help survivors of abuse. “Perhaps more importantly, sexual abuse contributes to enormous lost potential. A friend of mine told me recently of her cousin who was raped as a child. The woman didn’t tell anyone in the family for many years, instead she dealt with the memories by turning to alcohol,” she said, challenging men that trading money or gifts for sex with anyone under 18 is exploitative. Minister Botlogile Tshireletso urged men to assist the nation by declaring war against sexual exploitation and abuse of children.

“I want men to rise and speak out against this blessee-blesser phenomenon, ‘go ntshaditlhogo’ and other forms of abuse that we see being perpetuated by men on young girls within family units,” she said. Former minister Peter Siele, who is also UNICEF Advocacy champion encouraged churches to stand up and speak against sexual abuse and exploitation of children.