The Kogi State Government has warned against any form of sexual harassment across the various Tertiary institutions in the state.
The Kogi State Commissioner for Education, Wemi Jones gave the warning on Tuesday at a meeting between the Ministry of Education and heads of tertiary education institutions on state level adoption of the model anti-sexual harassment policy in tertiary institutions, in Lokoja.
Jones argued that sexual harassment has eaten deep into the the fabrics of the Nigeria society, adding that the present administration has put up machineries to apprehend anyone involved in sexual harassment in Kogi State.
“The objective of this meeting is to facilitate state level and adopt the model anti-sexual harassment policy and secure the buy-in of institutional heads on integration of campus safety initiative framework.
“Why has sexual harassment remained with us? Victims are usually scared to talk about them after being harassed because of stigmatization. That is why it has remained with us for a long time.
“The Federal Ministry of Education has commenced a program with states Commissioner of Education, Independent Corrupt Practices & Other Related Offences Commission (ICPC) and the Gender Mobile Initiative (GMI) as a way of ensuring that we reduce and totally eliminate sexual harassment especially on our tertiary institutions because that is where it happened the most.
“It is in this place you will see that father of the home is sexually harassing his daughter, house help and all manner of thing. It is not just one way. We have had incidence of the female gender harassing the other gender.
“After the meeting organized by the Federal Government to reduce sexual harassment, state governments were advised through their commissioners to bring it back home and domesticate it especially using the tertiary institutions.
“That is why we are here today. I am sure we know the stand of the Kogi State Government on the issues of crimes and criminalities. Sexual harassment is a major criminal act and the State Government will not condole it. You are aware that whenever there is a policy at the federal level, Kogi State is usually one of the first states to domesticate such policy.
“You would recall that towards the end of President Buhari’s tenure, there was the elongation of the service year for teachers. It is a national policy. Kogi State is one of the first states to implement that policy.
“Recently, the Federal Government started the Senior Secondary Education Commission. The Commission that will be similar to the Universal Basic Education Commission. Kogi State is now the first state in Nigeria to also domesticate that law. Because of our proactiveness, we are going to adopt the Policy Against Sexual Harassment in Kogi State.”
Jones added that there is need to come up with a robust document that will ensure a conducive learning environment across schools in the state.
Kogi Govt moves to check sexual harassment in tertiary institutions