Ghana not dealing with sexual abuse correctly - Group

Coalition Against Sexual Abuse (CASA) has said that, Ghana as a nation is not paying much attention to how sexual abuse are being dealt with.

According to Madam Esther Armah, a member of CASA, sexual predators face very mere charges and punishment and therefore do not find it very scary or threating to abuse someone as punishments are very mild.

Issues relating to teachers in senior high school level abusing female students have been of concern to CASA, and are calling for teachers who do such ungodly acts to be punished severely.

Speaking to Starr FM’s Francis Abban on Morning Starr, Madam Armah said,“The rule of law in this country should affect teachers with sexual misconduct.

They should not walk free. In Kenya when three students were raped, there was a protest by the people of the community and the head teacher of that school was forced to step down, the reason being that, such action was done during her tenure of office.

I’m pushed to say the Ghanaian laws are so liberal on sexual predators. I’ve heard stories that teachers who have been accused of sexual assault and harassment are transferred from one school to the other, or the worst thing they face is to be dismissed. This is unheard of; these people should be rightfully dealt with.”

Madam Armah also added that, doing this will serve as a deterrent to other teachers and also bring justice to the abused victims.

The case of sexual assault was brought to the public’s attention when it was reported that four teachers of Ejisuman Senior High School for sexual assaulting female students.

The first teacher, Isaac Amponsah, appointment has been terminated because it was established that he asked a student to rub his penis until he discharged on two occasions. The Ghana Education Service (GES) also found out that he had other immoral relationship with other students.

They found out that he was bullying the students, and then abuse of power where he used his authority for management to collect school fees and in return demanded unfavorable offers from the students.

Then the second teacher, Moses Asmah, has been directed that his appointment be terminated because he was also caught in the leaked video recording of sexual harassment and harassed a lot of students in the school.

Then the last two, Mr Ofei and Adu Asare, were also involved in professional misconduct. They also took some female students in their car to a guest house to drink, and so for these reasons Management established that indeed their appointment had to be terminated.