Call to inform people about laws

EMPOWERING communities with information and educating people with laws that protect children can minimise the abuse of minors, a counsellor says.
Papua New Guinea Counsellors Association trainer Ruby Matane said people needed to understand why crimes such as the sexual and physical abuse of children happen.
“One thing is that it all starts at the home,” she said.
“When the family is not in good order, the impact is transferred to the children.”
Matane said the abuse of minors had long lasting effects which would impact them in terms of their behaviour in the community.
She said stakeholders such as the welfare office and others who deal with abuse issues are underfunded and service providers lack the capacity to address the sexual abuse of minors and other related issues.
“Awareness on the relevant laws such as the Lukautim Pikinini Act and others are not known by many in both rural and urban areas,” Matane said.
She pointed out that one approach stakeholders could do was community response, to build the capacity of the community to address violence against women, children and men.
She said another approach was to equip the state’s service providers such as the police, welfare, courts and hospitals.
Matane used an example was a police officer not being able to handle a situation with a drug addict and having, instead, a trained professional giving advice and direction address the long term rehabilitation of the individual.
“If we do not have the right people skilled with knowledge to address certain problems at the community level, we will not address the problem fully and our children and those vulnerable people will still suffer,” she said.
Matane added that if people did not know about the dynamics of violence they would not be in a position to address the problem at its root cause.