The National Human Rights Commission (NHRC), says it has received at least 1238 written complaints on human rights abuses in Abia from January till date.
The State Coordinator, NHRC, Mrs Uche Nwokocha, made this known on Monday in Umuahia on the occasion of the International Day for the Elimination of Violence Against Women and beginning of 16 Days of Activism Against Gender-Based Violence(GBV).
The commission in collaboration with the National Orientation Agency and other partners, marched through major streets in Umuahia to campaign against GBV.
They also visited major motor parks in the metropolis to raise awareness and mobilise action to end all forms of violence against women and girls.
Nwokocha said that if those who walked into the commission’s office to complain or did so through phone calls were to be included, the number would be more than 5,000.
The coordinator said that the written complaints were mostly about civil liberties like abuses by the security agents, and gender-based violence.
She said that the commission received five complaints on rape this years, but decried the bottlenecks involved in the prosecution of those cases.
According to her, some cases of rape are first reported to the traditional rulers, but when negotiations between the rapist and the survivors fail, they come to us.
Nwokocha, a lawyer, disclosed that the commission already had seven GBV-related cases in court, but was yet to secure any conviction because of the slow pace of the state judiciary.
“The judges in Abia State Judiciary are overworked and we need more judges to handle some of these cases.
“You go to court, you see about 30 cases on the case list assigned to one judge on daily basis, whereas a judge, no matter how hard he tries, cannot handle more than five of them.
“It is not fair and this is delaying the process in the judiciary,” she decried.
Nwokocha said that the commission had outlined series of activities for the 16 Days of Activism, which would culminate with the International Human Rights Day celebration on Dec.10.
She said that some of the activities included quiz and debate by schools, lectures, visit to Abia House of Assembly, hospitals, churches, schools traditional rulers and others.(NAN)
