Legalise sex work - BONELA

BABOKI KAYAWE
Staff Writer | Monday January 17, 2011 00:00

 

Worse still, lack of specific legislation that prohibits sex work hampers access to prevention and treatment and it exposes sex workers to countless forms of abuse and harassment.

This came to light at a two-day Parliamentary HIV/AIDS Committee orientation session attended by policy makers and stakeholders in the anti-HIV and AIDS war.

It was revealed that law enforcement officers, especially the police, benefit from sex work. The involvement of police officers and security guards in the exploitation of street sex workers startled attendants. BONELA Sex Work Advocacy Project officer and Training Coordinator, Anna Mmolai-Chalmers, asked parliamentarians on Thursday to repeal the existing legislation because it is not specific to sex work.

'The current legislation does not prohibit sex work. Neither does it allow it. The law that is used to charge sex workers is just mum. They are being charged for loitering,' she said. Mmolai-Chalmers said it is unfortunate that police officers demand sexual favours from these people so that they are freed of charges of loitering.

She further said for sexual workers, it is not all about sex but it is work for them and an economic exercise.

'It is a pity that police officers often ask for monetary exchanges so that sex workers could be freed,' Mmolai-Chalmers said. She further said security guards in places where the sex workers go to find clients have resorted to making them pay to wait on the premises, failing which they harass them.

'They are being made to pay P20 or P50 rental to wait in those places,' she added.Moreover, since most of the sex workers end up known by police officers, they are treated unfairly when cases of rape arise because they are dismissed lightly as hawkers. In the process, they are robbed off their rights.

Member of Parliament for Mogoditshane, also chairperson of the Parliamentary HIV/AIDS Committee, Patrick Masimolole, said, the legislature has to discuss the issue of sex work seriously if Botswana is to win the war against HIV and AIDS.

Francistown South MP, Wynter Mmolotsi said it is time the country thinks differently and comes up with different approaches as criminalisation of sex work endangers life rather than curbing the problem it was intended to correct.  'Maybe it should be done within the parameters of the law, because in that case if a sex worker is raped the law would take its course and relevant measures against wrong doings would be taken like in any other industry,' he said.

Though sex is one of the taboo subjects in the Tswana culture which is not openly discussed, the Parliamentary HIV/AIDS Committee agreed to take the issue of sex work to their various constituencies and have it debated, as the general consensus was that the issue is 'complex and has to be tackled nonetheless'.