Boys More Vulnerable To Rape In Nigeria – NAPTIP Boss, Okah-Donli

The Director-General of The National Agency for the Prohibition of Trafficking in Persons (NAPTIP), Julie Okah-Donli, says young boys in Nigeria are more vulnerable to rape than girls.

Speaking at the flag-off of the ‘Cover me’ campaign aimed at exposing perpetrators of child abuse on Saturday, Okah-Donli premised her statement on the fact that many people tend to focus more on girls being raped and forget the reality that the incident of rape for boys in Nigeria is currently on the increase.

She however advocated not for stricter punishment for rapists, but for stronger mechanisms for preventing such hideous act.

“I do not advocate for capital punishment of death sentence because it will make rapists become brutal because they will not want to leave witnesses and it will also encourage jungle justice with people using it to accuse and kill people falsely,” she said.

“Boys are more vulnerable to rape because we tend to focus more on girls so we need to focus on all our children. Now you see a lot of silly videos with people sharing and reposting, If you send it to me I will arrest you for child pornography, anyone who stigmatizes against victims will be punished. We need to make people know that we are serious.

“During the lockdown, a lot of things where revealed to us, we realized that most of the reports we got was from observant neighbors and not parents.”