ActionAid Nigeria in collaboration with other Coalition of Civil Society groups on Friday staged a peaceful protest calling on the federal government to declare a state of emergency on Gender and Sexual Based Violence.
The protest which was staged at the Nigerian Police Force, headquarters in Abuja was as a result of the increase of rape incidence in the country.
The ActionAid Country Director, Ene Obi, lamented that security operatives that are meant to protect are also threatening to rape and kill women and girls.
She said they need urgent declaration of state of emergency in every state in Nigeria to accelerate investigation, arrest and prosecution of offenders.
Also, the founder of Dorothy Njemanze Foundation, Dorothy Njemanze expressed concern that domestic and gender based violence is killing many and there are no provisions to pay the victims hospital bills.
She said the sexual and gender based violence is an emergency so they are calling for state of emergency to be declared as a matter of urgency before the end of next week by the government so that time lines can be given to ensure all the states are doing the right thing.
On her part, the Manager Women Rights Program ActionAid Nkechi Ilochi-Omekedo said “we are saying enough is a enough, we are not at war but with what is happening everyday it appears as though we are at war”.
She urged the Judiciary, Executive, legislature to rise up and protect women and girls and ensure that perpetrators are brought to justice.
Responding on behalf of the Nigerian Police Force, the NPF spokesperson, Frank Uba , said police understands the pains and frustration of protesters .
He called on stakeholder to work together to end the conspiracy of silence saying it is driven with the fact that rape cases are not reported.
“We must work together to build a generation of bold women to report rape cases and we must also ensure that we maintain every crime scene that will help the police do their investigation properly,” he said.
Other civil groups that participated in the protest are TeacherNG, Girl Child Africa, Connected Development, Enough is Enough Nigeria, Stand to End rape, Silver Chip Fox, Yiaga Africa, and Education as a Vaccine Foundation .
