With the dust barely settling on the Minister for Gender, Children and Social Protection, Otiko Djaba’s advise to girls to dress decently to avoid being raped, the Minister has hit back at critics of her comments saying she does not regret her utterances.
According to the Minister, the advice she offered during the 90th anniversary and speech and prize giving day for Krobo Girls Presbyterian Senior School, was based on genuine love and concern for girls who are like her daughters.
Madam Djaba subsequently came under severe backlash from a cross-section of Ghanaians who said her comments were only giving an excuse for rapists, since there was no proof that one’s way of dressing entices rapists.
The Minister had argued that, although one’s dressing can be fashionable, they should be responsible for the choice they make.
Speaking to Citi News on the sidelines of a Social Protection Dialogue on the theme “Promoting Productive Inclusion for Sustainable Economic Growth” Madam Djaba said girls needed to know their dressing could provoke some men to rape or assault them sexually.
“Every right has a responsibility. If you have a right to speak, it doesn’t mean you should say just anything. After 18, you can marry, you can have sex; but you must protect yourselves from a pregnancy you do not want and from sexual diseases. So if I say you have a right to dress the way you want, then you must be aware that how you dress could provoke somebody else. You must make a choice in your best interest and as a parent, I have every right to advise my children. I am a Krobo, and I was talking to my own sisters and children.”
Media took my words out of context Madam Djaba also accused journalists of taking her words out of context, and picking and choosing only bad news and neglecting the “real issues”.
“People must understand that, when we speak, the journalists will pick what they want from it. I will plead with the media to stop focusing on me and concentrate on the real issues. I know that bad news sells because all the other things I said at the programme were not reported because they were good and people like to talk about negative news.”
She however said she was happy with her comments as it had “opened up a discussion about ourselves as a people.”
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