Police Under Public Scrutiny To Act Quickly And Investigate Rape Claim Against Officer

The public uproar over a senior Police officer be­ing investigated for child rape is understand­able and justified.

The officer was only told to go on leave pending in­vestigations by the Criminal Investigations Depart­ment after questions were asked why he was still at work.

Child rape is a serious crime. In fact it is heinous. The question needs to be asked as to why he was still working when investigation had started.

To make matters worse, he was even awarded a 50th Independence commemorative medal.

Now serious questions are being raised on the in­dependence of the investigations. The Fiji Women’s Crisis Centre had lodged a report about the alleged offence two months ago with the Police. It is a alleged the officer in question who was in charge of a key Po­lice Station, raped the girl, a daughter of a friend.

The Fiji Human Rights and Anti-Discrimination Commission waded in as the controversy broke out. Director Ashwin Raj called for the suspension of the officer in the interest of transparency and account­ability without impunity.

In the absence of any explanation and details, who made the decision to keep him working? Whoever is responsible is also culpable in this matter because the proper procedural action was not taken.

Any form of sexual offence against females is abhor­rent. In this case it is worse because it is against a child.

Imagine the physical and emotional trauma that this child is going through.

The Police are guardians of the law. They enforce the law. When they fail to do their due diligence they leave themselves wide open to public criticism and scrutiny as it has happened in this case.

When one of them is accused, irrespective of their rank or seniority, the proper cause of action must be taken. That is he or she should be suspended pending investigations to ensure that they are not interfered with, influenced or compromised.

Rape of minors are part of the growing number of sexual offences recorded every month against women and children.

While this is a matter of grave concern, it is even more disturbing that some perpetrators were mem­bers of the Fiji Police Force. The Police should be in the frontline protecting the vulnerable from sexual predators. When one of them becomes the alleged perpetrator it lowers public confidence in them.

The zero tolerance policy on sexual offences and domestic violence applies to everyone including the Police. No one is above the law.

It’s in the public interest that this case is quickly in­vestigated and a decision made whether to lay charg­es or not.