Bartica, Mahdia earmarked for Special Victims Units - Social Protection Minister

Bartica, Mahdia earmarked for Special Victims Units – Social Protection Minister

Aug 09, 2015 News

As it seeks to tackle the scourge of domestic and sexual violence, the government is working to set up teams comprising investigators, social workers and psychologists that will be dedicated exclusively to working sex crimes and domestic violence cases in Bartica and Mahdia.

Minister of Social Protection,
Volda Lawrence

The new units, dubbed the Special Victims Units (SVUs), form part of efforts to effectively tackle the issue. Minister of Social Protection, Volda Lawrence recently told this publication that the government is seeking to establish SVUs nearer to the locations where cases of rape are occurring more frequently, rather than in the city.
SVUs are usually funded with requisite social workers and investigators trained to handle cases of rape, sexual harassment, sexual molestation, and other types of sexual violence and domestic violence.
“We need to ensure that we have the type of unit that is necessary to house those victims in a place and with people who understand their situation and can empathize with them,” Lawrence said.
The Social Protection Minister divulged that Bartica and Mahdia have been earmarked as SVU locations. Barima-Waini (Region One) is being considered, according to Lawrence. “Those two areas we are focusing on to see how quickly we can get a place whereby we would be able to establish a housing unit for those victims,” Lawrence said.
Interior Locations
In the city, she explained, the support is tremendous since victims may have easier access to religious leaders and places of faith and non-governmental organizations.
“There are support-mechanisms on the coastland but in those areas there are not and victims feel the brunt of it because they have to end up at police stations, they are made to remain in cells and all of these things.”
The police in these locations, the Minister lamented, do not have alternate places to house these victims, be it children or adults.
She said the onus is now on the government to ensure that the mechanisms are in place to appropriately address these cases when they arise.
“When we find it happening, we must be able to put those people in a safe place, a safe and caring place,” the Social Protection Minister emphasized.
Lawrence also spoke of cases where victims are perceived as reluctant to speak out against their aggressors. The Minister surmised, “It is because sometimes you take them from a harsh reality and put them in another harsh reality so they are caught between a rock and a hard place.”
This is something the government intends to change.
“We have to change that. When people come into our care, people must understand that these are a set of people who are willing to ‘walk the walk’ and ‘talk the talk’ with them to the end until we can get them up and running, as any one of us, functioning in the society and taking care of themselves and their family,” said Lawrence.
Rape Centers
In the Guyana Police Force (GPF) June statistics on crime, rape was listed as one of the serious crimes policed. The statistics showed an increase of 74 percent in the number of reports of rape when compared to 2014.
At the end of June this year, there were 207 reports compared to 119 for the same period last year. The Police said, too, that the majority of the reports came from Georgetown (‘A’ Division) and the East Coast of Demerara (‘C’ Division).
In the past, women who took their stories of rape to the media complained that the police are inadequately prepared to handle rape reports. Victims had also expressed fear of non-prosecution due to their rapists having “links” in high places.
With the whopping increase in the number of reported rapes, Crime Chief Wendell Blanhum had explained that mechanisms have been put in place by the Guyana Police Force (GPF) to tackle the problem.
He said one of the mechanisms to deal with rape is the installation of sexual offences units in each Police Division. He said too that special care was taken to place female investigators within the units to interact with the victims and ensure that they feel comfortable.
The GPF, he said, is working on removing feelings of distrust. He said that a social crime prevention programme has been launched.
Aggressive Approach from Govt.
The government too has spoken of a more aggressive report to sexual and domestic violence. “With regards to rape, I would like to tell you this: This is a very serious situation, not only in the communities but in our work places,” Minister Lawrence said at a United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) forum held recently.
There, the Minister revealed that on her first day, she met with a young woman who was sexually molested by the Head of an agency. “The file is now with the DPP. That tells you how I am going to deal with the incidences. It must stop,” said the Social Protection Minister.
Also in its 2015 Elections manifesto, the coalition, A Partnership for National Unity and Alliance for Change (APNU+AFC) which now governs, had promised to immediately implement SVUs at all Police stations with qualified social workers to handle crimes against women.
“The Guyana Police Force (especially female police officers and the Special Victims Unit) will be mandated to institute charges against a perpetrator without the victim’s consent,” the government had proposed to do.
It said too it will ensure the employment of trained Psychologists to counsel battered and otherwise abused women.
“These Psychologists/Counsellors shall operate clinics, hospitals but shall also work along with the Special Victims Unit of the Guyana Police Force,” they intimated.