MANY persons who were molested in their childhood days, who subsequently, upon attaining maturity seek redress for the wrongs committed on them, are often reviled and castigated, even by family members; especially if the perpetrator is a public figure.

And the authorities, even those who pretend to champion the victim when it suits their purposes and agendas, often throw all their support behind the offender. One primary case in point is a pedophile who; while pretending to help single mothers, prey on their children – sometimes as young as eight years old, and even younger.

This person is a past presidential candidate who, whenever the victim reaches adulthood and seeks justice, cries victimisation by the Government.

There is a serious warning posted in Albouystown ‘No bail for child molesters,’ and perpetrators can expect no mercy in that community, because many times the justice system abysmally fails the victims.

Indeed, there should be no bail for child molesters. However, for whatever reason, incidents of child molestation and rape are increasing rather than decreasing because of the laxity of law enforcement officials, despite the severe and punitive legislation enacted through the militancy of former Human Services and Social Security, and current Education Minister, Priya Manickchand.

The law enforcement and justice systems are failing a number of victims, and a primary case that comes to mind is one in which a young girl was drugged, taken to a house, and had all sorts of atrocities committed on her before being locked in by the high-profile perpetrator and his girlfriend.
The naked victim climbed through a window where she hung precariously before being spotted by a passerby and was rescued. What ensued was a highly-publicised case of abduction, rape, and sodomy.
However, mere months after, that perpetrator, who has a very powerful father and is distinguishable in public on his own account, was hosting public events and is walking free to this day.

The authorities don’t seem to even care about the anguish and grave distress of the victims and their families. What happens more as a norm rather than an exception is that the law enforcers seem not to care about the poor, powerless, voiceless and vulnerable. It is felt that the powerful and monied can easily purchase and subvert justice in this country; and the jail proliferates with many innocent victims while many real criminals walk the streets, free to continue the depredations on the real victims of society.

Another aspect of sexual molestation that has intermittently surfaced in the media is that relating to student molestation by teachers; but this is only the tip of the iceberg, as there have been many cases where teachers who have been accused are allowed to remain on the job without the requisite protective mechanisms being put in place to ensure the safety of students.

In the Corentyne, a teenager who was raped in her kitchen by her adult neighbour took her own life because the perpetrator was allowed to walk free and continued to harass her, while other villagers either taunted or shunned her.

Fathers, grandfathers, uncles, brothers, other relatives and friends, teachers, public officials, and strangers rape, fondle, sodomise the innocents in society and get off either scot-free, or with a figurative tap on the wrist by members of the justice (sic!) system.

There was a recent case of sisters in a village who had been habitually abused by several members of their community, with full knowledge of the entire community, who merely saw the girls as discardable trash. These children were so damaged from being raped by adult males from very tender ages that doctors said they would never be able to conceive, because damages to their reproductive organs were extensive and irreparable.

The incidents are spiralling and in one edition of a daily newspaper there were reported no less than seven cases of child abuses; perpetrators of three were teachers, two were fathers, one a taxi driver, and one a landlord.

Two of the teachers were remanded, while the other was placed on station bail, the taxi driver and landlord were in custody pending police investigations (sic!), and the father of the son and daughter whom he raped and sodomised has been remanded.

The Media also reported on the case of convicted rapist Kenston Drakes, where an all-male jury found him guilty, after which Justice Franklyn Holder sentenced him to 16 years in prison.

Kudos to Justice Holder, also magistrate Roby Benn who remanded Ronald Forde to prison; and magistrate Nyasha Williams-Hatmin who remanded the father who raped and sodomised his own children to prison; and shame on the magistrate who let the Saraswat Primary School child molester go.

The emotional, psychological, and physical damage caused the victims of these perpetrators is irreparable, such as in the instance of the baby boy whose digestive tract was destroyed by a father who sodomised him while the child was left in his care, which is another of a plethora of incidents where rapacious beasts ravage the innocence and lives of the society’s children.

But it is not the law-enforcement agencies that are failing the children of the land; it is the members of communities who witness the unspeakable acts and stay quiet, preferring to mind their own business and not make waves.

Director of the Child Care and Protection Agency, Ms. Ann Green, told Chronicle recently in an invited comment that the agency is absolutely frustrated with the response and the level of slothfulness on the part of the Police Force in dealing with cases of this nature, as well as the latitude allowed the perpetrators in the judicial process, despite the revised Sexual Offences Act.

Authorities should seek ways of strengthening the facilitating and implementation mechanisms so that the laws are brought into full effect against child molesters, especially in relation to placing such perpetrators on bail.

This newspaper, for a long time now, has been calling for the President and Human Services Minister’s efforts not to go to waste, and that the facilitating and implementation mechanisms for all the systems and programmes that they have driven to protect the nation’s children from predators in the society be enforced by the conjunctive sectors, especially the security and judicial forces. Only a holistic approach could reduce, if not completely eradicate, this particularly heinous scourge from society.

The recent imbroglio involving a prominent political figure and member of the legal profession bears out this newspaper’s contention, that the weak and the powerless have no recourse to justice against the rich and powerful; because the former’s voice has been silenced by the very structures of the law that is supposed to access him justice; while the latter’s voice is loud and strident in his own defence; even as he sits and grandiloquently pontificates on the nation’s business. The outcome of this case, as in the case of the aforementioned paedophile, is a foregone conclusion.