ICPC, Stakeholders Review Draft Policy on Sexual Harassment

In a renewed bid to contain the incidences of sexual harassment in academic institutions, Chairman of the Independent Corrupt Practices and Other Related Offences Commission (ICPC), Prof Bolaji Owasanoye (SAN), yesterday charged educational institutions to formulate and enforce individual sexual harassment policies in order to stem the tide of sexual harassment in the academia.

Speaking in the same vein, the Executive Director, Gender Mobile Initiative, Omowumi Ogunrotimi, said the past few years witnessed a global reckoning for perpetrators of sexual harassment, especially by abusers who wield significant power over the abused.

He said Nigerian tertiary institutions had become the centre for power-driven gender-based violence and harassment, noting that the challenge had not received the required corresponding level of attention.

In his remarks at a one-day seminar themed: “National Stakeholders’ Engagement and Presentation of Model Policies on Sexual Harassment in Educational Institutions”, Prof Owasanoye urged educational institutions to formulate “their own stand-alone sexual harassment policy, not just one paragraph in their staff handbook. More importantly, to enforce it.

Prevention is always better than cure and it is hoped that stakeholders will rise to the challenge of joining the commission to fight this crime and societal menace”.

He said sexual harassment had,  over the years, been found to be a form of corruption.

“It is a deviation from the norm for an official of an institution to use his office or position to demand, receive, obtain or attempt to obtain any form of sexual gratification in order for him to execute his duties or as reward for doing his duties. “The ideal is for official duties to be done with integrity, good conscience and diligence without the expectation of any unlawful benefit but in Nigeria, it seems the reverse has almost become the norm”, he said.

In his remarks, the Deputy Senate President, Ovie Omo-Agege, commended the stakeholders’ meeting on the resolve to initiate a discussion on the presentation of a draft model sexual harrassment policy for educational institutions in the country was long overdue.

Omo-Agege, who was represented by his Chief of Staff, Dr Otive Igbuzor, said the collaboration between ICPC and Ford Foundation on the matter would go a long way to contain the menace of sexual harassment in the academia.