MORE DETAILED MAK SEXUAL HARRASMENT REPORT TO BE RELEASED

Written by: 
Nakakoni Elizabeth

 

The five-member committee investigating sexual harassment in Makerere University is to release a more comprehensive report. The report released earlier has been criticized for being shallow and leaving out critical areas like sexual harassment cases involving non-teaching staff, and that suffered by male students.

 

Dr. Sylvia Tamale who chaired the committee revealed this during the 'Mak Diva safety campain' where she was guest of honour. The Mak Diva Safety Campaign was addressing issues of sexual harassment and violence against women.

 

Promising to do a better job, Dr. Tamale said, “Whereas the interviewees in the previous reports included students as well as academic staff in Schools, Faculties and Colleges of Makerere University, the non-teaching staff were left out”.

 

To her, in order to reach to the gist of sexual harassment in Makerere University, and have a more comprehensive report, all views have to be captured. It is against this backdrop that she announced that a new report is underway.

 

However, a Makerere University lecturer who doubles as the MUASA chairperson, Dr. Deus Muhwezi Kamunyu says that there has been conflict of interest that has prevented the successful prosecution of these known cases of sexual harassment. To him, all perpetrators are known but he wonders why they are never brought to book.

 

Makerere University Vice Chancellor, Professor Barnabas Nawangwe, appointed the committee to investigate reports of sexual harassment in the institution on 2nd March 2018.

 

This followed numerous claims by female students at the university that male lecturers and administrators were demanding for sexual favors in the course of their duty. Some of the cases were reported in the media, some in court while others were being investigated.

 

The Makerere University policy and regulations against sexual harassment define the term “sexual harassment” as “unwelcome sexual advances, requests for sexual favors and unwanted physical, verbal or non-verbal conduct of a sexual nature.”

 

The committee recommended that the university should install CCTV cameras in all strategic places around campus to curb the vice and further set a deadline of May 31st 2019 for the University Council to install CCTV cameras in key buildings including corridors as well as providing adequate lighting throughout the campus.