Sexual Violence among Women and Children in the Caraga Region

Sexual violence has a negative and traumatic life experience with extensive psychological and sociological effects on the victims irrespective of their gender. Moreover, sexual violence can happen to anyone, man or woman at any age. Sexual assault in childhood or adulthood affects not only the victim but also the victim’s family and friends as well as society as a whole. This research is a descriptive qualitative design. Two sets of interview questionnaires were made for the 60 respondents: 6 victims, 34 PNP desk officers, and 20 social workers. The findings were carefully analyzed and validated. The research was conducted in the five provinces and one highly urbanized city of Butuan in the CARAGA region. From the results, it is imperative to conclude that sexual violence like rape is highly prevalent, a serious problem in the Caraga region that can have lasting, harmful effects on victims and their families, friends, and communities. The solutions are just as complex as the problem. Thus, a collaborative effort is needed to prevent this problem. Recommendations were proposed based on the findings and conclusion of this study that are patterned from the National Centre for Injury Prevention and Control, Division of Violence Prevention program, as follows: 1) Promote social rules that protect against sexual violence by engaging and mobilizing the youth and adult males as allies. Let them be part of the front liners in the various advocacy campaigns for massive social awareness, 2)Teach skills among women and children to prevent sexual violence through social-emotional learning sessions; Teaching healthy-safe dating and intimate relationship skills to adolescents; Promoting health sexuality; and Empowerment-based training or seminar, 3) Provide opportunities to empower and support women and children by strengthening economic supports for women and families and strengthening leadership and opportunities for the children, 4) Create protective environments through improving safety and monitoring in schools; establishing and consistently applying workplace policies and addressing community-level risks through environmental safety approaches and provide basic self-defense skills, 5) Support victims/survivors to lessen harms through victim-centered services; treatment for victims of sexual violence; and treatment for at-risk children and families to prevent problem behavior including sex offending. Strengthened and mobilized the ERPAT (Empowerment and Reaffirmation of Paternal Abilities) program as well as the functionality of BCPC (Barangay Council for the Protection of Children), and 6) Establish a mobile “Sexual Violence Victim Centers” where the communication access is strong to monitor and rescue sexually abused victims in the locality.