Sex-For-Grades: Ekiti State First Lady, Bisi Fayemi Says She Was Also A Victim of Sexual Harassment, Tells What must Be Done To Curb The Menace
Bisi Fayemi, the First Lady of Ekiti State has reacted to the trending documentary released by BBC Africa in which they carried out an undercover investigation and exposed the rot in West African universities where lecturers demand sex from female students and reward them with good grades.
Mrs. Fayemi who spoke in Lagos on Monday during the exclusive screening of the BBC Africa Eye undercover investigation documentary said she could relate to the plight of female students at the hands of their male lecturers, noting that she was also sexually harassed in her days as an undergraduate.
The first part of the documentary caught a UNILAG lecturer, who unaware that he was been filmed schemed for sex with a 17-year-old undercover journalist posing as a student on different occasions. Read here for more.
The First Lady who noted that she cried while watching the viral video said that she was also was sexually harassed in her days as an undergraduate but she was luckier than some of the victims because hers didn’t go far, even though it remains an unpleasant experience.
Fayemi stated that watching the video made her realize that it is time to speak up and speak out for sexual abuse victims and not silence them because the culture of silence has endured enough. She added that most lecturers feel they are entitled to the body of their female students, and that now is the time for accountability.
Read what she said below:
“I cried because what this young women have experience is the story of many of us who passed through higher institution in this country,”
she said.
I was educated here in Nigeria and I too was a victim of sexual harassment during my university days. I was luckier than these victims.
It didn’t go that far but it was extremely unpleasant and of course back in the days when all these things happened you can’t tell anyone because if you do even up till now people ask you to keep shut.
You know people don’t talk about things like this. I was watching the documentary and there were three words that came to me, one is voice, it is time to speak up and speak out and for those who do we need to stand with them and stand by them and not silence them because the culture of silence has endured enough.
Another word that came to me was accountability, we need to be accountable whether there are parents, guidance or teachers or leaders in any form through out the different section of society.
We have to be accountable for the well being and health of the young people in our care, from when our children come to say mummy, uncle so so and so touched me and instead of asking further to find out what’s its all about, we should act.
There has to be accountability and the third thing that came to mind was justice, justice for victim or I choose to call them survivors and so those of us who have worked in the women’s whether at international level or Africa or national air in Nigeria,
we know that we have many law and policies in place that are supposed to guard against things such as this but this law sometimes means very little because there is inadequate political”
she said.