Batswana under investigation for child pornography

Mpho Mokwape | Thursday October 16, 2014 16:03

In an interview the Botswana Police Service (BPS) public relations officer, Christopher Mbulawa said even though they have not charged anyone with the offence, they have a list of people they are investigating.

He said through constant communication with Interpol they have established that some of the people on the list are Batswana while others are resident in the country.

These people are internationally listed for possession, manufacturing and distribution of child pornographic material on the Internet said Mbulawa.

“Between June and September alone this year, we received 106 notifications from Interpol and out of that number 26 were Batswana.

We have specifically established the number of Batswana involved in the matter and five of them are currently being questioned.

“But we do have quite a number of both citizens and foreigners that we would still pursue with our investigations,” he said.

However, Mbulawa acknowledged and explained the difficulty in investigating cases involving children, adding that often people are not even aware that what they were doing and sharing can be depicted as child pornography.

He said often people go as far as sharing naked or half-dressed pictures or videos of their children, nephews and nieces to other family members which in turn seems like an innocent exchange while under the law it is an offence to do so.

“We do sometimes arrest people that claim ignorance that the exchange and distribution of pornographic or obscene material through the Internet constitutes an offence punishable by law.

At the same time we do have those that deliberately send and share child pornographic materials,” he said.

He further urged the public to desist from participating in such acts, adding that it is a serious offence contrary to Section 16 (3) of the Cyber crime and Computer Related Crime Act to exchange, distribute pornographic or obscene material depicting children on social media.

Under the Act it states that child pornography includes material that visually or otherwise depicts a child engaged in sexually explicit conduct, a person who appears to be a child engaged in sexually explicit conduct, realistic images representing a child engaged in sexually explicit conduct, and states that a child means a person who is under the age of 14 years.

While sexually explicit conduct means any conduct, whether real or simulated, which involves sexual intercourse, including genital-genital, oral-genital, anal genital or oral-anal, between children, or between an adult and a child, of the same or opposite sex, masturbation, sadistic or masochistic sexual abuse, or the exhibition of the genitals or pubic area of a child.

The Act also states that any person caught accessing child pornography or obscene material relating to children through a computer or computer system, commits an offence and shall be sentenced to a minimum fine of P40,000 but not exceeding P100,000, or to imprisonment for a minimum term of two years but not exceeding three years, or to both.

Earlier, the BPS in a press statement said they were concerned of the growing trend of exchange and distribution of pornographic or obscene material involving children on social media.

“Of great concern is the exchange or distribution of real or stimulated pictures depicting children engaged in sexual intercourse, exhibition of the private parts of children and other immoral sexual activities”, said the statement.