THE Lagos State University Tertiary Education Trust Fund (TETFUND) National Research Fund Grant Rape Research Team concluded the arduous assignment recently and presented its research findings to the public in the cosy ACEITSE Lecture Hall on LASU main campus, Ojo on Wednesday, November 6, 2024. The N34m research endeavour was funded by the Tertiary Education Trust Fund (TETFUND).
The 8-man team, superintended by the Deputy Vice-Chancellor, Academic, Prof. Olufunsho Omobitan as the Principal Investigator, presented its key findings at the history-making dissemination seminar.
While speaking, Professor Olufunsho Omobitan stressed that the project has fostered interdisciplinary collaboration across the University, involving experts from the Departments of Economics, Sociology, Counselling, Geography, and Planning.
On her part, the Vice-Chancellor, Prof. Ibiyemi Olatunji-Bello, mni, NPOM, in her address, described the study as “an unprecedented, most comprehensive, and most profoundly empirical study on rape in Nigeria”, urging all relevant stakeholders to give the outcome all the seriousness it deserves.
She said, “Rape, you will all agree with me, is a global social and public health problem. In virtually all cultures, violent sexual engagement and defilement of all categories of females is a disturbing reality.”
She, therefore, posited that the recommendations of the research must be taken seriously by all stakeholders, including Government agencies, lawmakers, advocacy groups, community leaders, school administrators, teachers, parents, guardians, religious leaders, individuals and the public.
She also tasked everyone in positions of power at any level to safeguard female children as well as adult and aged women who are the major victims of rape in rural and urban communities.
Meanwhile, she reaffirmed her administration’s avowed commitment to advancing research and innovation as a vital point in her mission to make the institution the best in Africa.
Meanwhile, Prof. Onipede Wusu, the Coordinator of the team of researchers, gave a forensic detail of the uphill journey of the project titled: Emerging Patterns and Determinants of Rape: Comparative Study of Rural-Urban Communities in Nigeria.
According to the Professor of Sociology, the project formally kicked off in April 2021 with the N34m research grant from TETFund. Wusu recalled that the N34m TETFUND grant was released rather late but the team of self-motivated and resilient scholars rose and kept flying notwithstanding all the odds.
According to the Coordinator, the team had originally planned to hold two-phased dissemination seminars in Lagos and Abuja but the persistent inflationary flight in the country had eaten up a good chunk of the grant; hence forcing the team to limit the seminar to Lagos.
The arduous task saw the team members sailing through all manners of storms, including economic, social and even personal risk to life as evident in the multidimensional security threats in the country.
However, Wusu thanked the Almighty God, TETFUND, the Vice-Chancellor, Olatunji-Bello and the team of researchers for the ultimate success of the first-of-its-kind scholarly exercise on rape in Nigeria.
According to Wusu, the team deployed a mixed-method approach to generate and analyse quantitative and qualitative data on emerging patterns and determinants of rape among females in the rural and urban communities in 12 Nigerian States, which cut across the six geopolitical zones of the country with a sample population of 3,023 (all female).
The findings suggest that rape incidence is generally higher in rural areas than in the urban communities of Nigeria.
The research also reveals that family members and neighbours are the principal perpetrators of rape while listing childhood sexual abuse experience, ethnicity, and childhood family background (especially broken homes) as critical risk factors for various forms of rape.
The research findings, as individually presented by each of the eight members of the team, established that there is evidence of childhood sexual abuse, rape among young females, women of reproductive age, elderly females, and marital rape in rural and urban communities.
The research findings showed the prevalence of sexual violence across different age groups, with childhood sexual abuse rates at thirty-five (35) per cent nationally, and slightly varying between urban and rural areas, and ten (10) per cent of currently married women and eleven (11) per cent of never-married women reported experiences of rape, while vulnerable adult groups reported fifteen (15) per cent prevalence.
It concluded that to curtail the incidence of rape in Nigeria, effective child protection law, sustained by rigorous and consistent media-aided campaigns against sexual violence and harmful lifestyles as well as family sanctity is imperative.
A high point of the programme was the unveiling of the project policy brief by the Vice-Chancellor for the benefit of the University, the State, and the Nation at large.
Members of the research team who were drawn from five departments of two faculties comprise Prof. Olufunsho Omobitan, Prof. Onipede Wusu, Prof. Folashade Airat, Dr Ibrahim Rotimi Aliu, Dr Adijat Olateju, Dr Alausa Waheed, Dr Busoye Olupooye, and Dr Sakiru Raji.
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