Parliament has been told that about 900 under-age girls were raped countrywide in a space of three months.
The cases of rape are said to have occurred between October and December 2020 and do not include unreported cases.
Speaking in the National Assembly, Woman Affairs Minister Sithembiso Nyoni said the situation was alarming, but added that more worrisome was getting figures of the unreported cases.
“The Victim Friendly Unit of the Zimbabwe Republic Police received 1 222 cases of rape in the third quarter of 2020 and in the fourth quarter they received 1 274 cases countrywide.
“A total of 836 girls, 17 years and below, were raped in the period October to December 2019 and in the same period in 2020, 900 girls were raped and these were reported cases.
“We still grapple to understand the real magnitude in view of unreported cases as the Committee has rightfully pointed out that most cases go unreported at the community level.
“My Ministry, therefore, commits to scale up community-level awareness raising with the aim to encourage report of such incidents, especially where minors are the victims.
“The community has to know that it is criminal to withhold such information as well as failure to report abuse and rape of minors,” she said.
Nyoni’s revelation comes at time when about 5000 under-age girls were reportedly impregnated countrywide in a space of 36 days (January to 5th of February 2021)
More worrying is the fact that Mashonaland Central accounts for most of the statistics with about 4475 out of 4959 cases.
In the same period about 1774 under-age girls were also married in the country and are likely to drop out of school which could hamper their ability to reach their potential in life.
Zimbabwe has however tried to put in place measures that allow pregnant girls to continue with school, but it’s unlikely the majority of the girls will take the offer.-
