By Simdi Gloria:-
Ahmad Lawan, the Senate President on Tuesday said in addition to empowerment, efforts will be made to protect women and girls, especially from sexual predators.
He also called for stiffer penalties against convicted rapists.
Lawan pledged this in a speech after he was given an award of HeForShe by a group of women led by the Minister of Women Affairs, Dame Pauline Tallen in Abuja.
He said, “Last year the incident of rape was rampant but thank God it is coming down and I believe that the consequences on anyone involved in rape incident must be extremely punitive and prohibitive.
“If you educate or empower a girl is like you educate the nation. The reverse is also the case. If you destroy one is like destroying the nation.
“So for anyone to engage in destroying the lives of innocent, sometimes even little babies, I didn’t know if death sentence will not be the kind of necessary punishment for this kind of a thing.
“Our laws must be extremely stiff to protect our women and girls from this kind of pedophile behaviour and attitude to life”.
According to Tallen, HeForShe is a global initiative and a solidarity movement for gender equality between men and women.
She said the award to the Senate President was in recognition of his support to women issues and urged the Senate to amend the 1999 constitution to repeal discriminatory laws that hinder the realisation of gender equality and women advancement.
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