The Parliamentary Sectoral Oversight Committee on Children, Women, and Gender has disagreed with the proposed amendments to Sections 363 and 354 of the Penal Code (Chapter 19) - dealing with rape and its punishments - for the lowering of the age of consent of girls to 14 years and to mitigate sentencing in cases of statutory rape.
The Committee convened at Parliament on Wednesday (27) chaired by MP attorney Thalatha Athukorala.
The said Bill to amend the Penal Code was presented to the Parliament on 5 March. The mitigated sentencing proposed for statutory rape allows for the suspended sentencing of adult males up to 22 years old and for the lowering of the age of consent of girls to 14 years.
The Committee addressed consequences such as: the power imbalance between adult males and young girls aged 14; that minors are considered not to have the cognitive and emotional maturity to fully understand the consequences and implications of their decisions; and that the proposed amendment undermines the legal protection designed to safeguard minors from sexual exploitation and abuse, physical, emotional and psychological consequences, especially teenage pregnancies and sexually transmitted infections, increased school dropouts and cases of sexual and gender based violence. Therefore, the Committee opposed these amendments.
Further, the Committee decided to make a written request to the Secretary to the Ministry of Justice, Prison Affairs and Constitutional Reforms, making the following recommendations: that judicial discretion in relation to sentencing must only be exercised with regard to offenders of or below the age of 18 years -i.e., offenders above the age of 18 years shall not be granted suspended sentences or a minimum sentence of less than 10 years; that the age of consent in cases of statutory rape must be left intact at 16 years; to provide clear guidelines for establishing ‘consent’; to introduce a separate clause criminalising the offence of committing the rape of boys; and to take aboard the views of the Ministry of Health and the Ministry of Women, Child Affairs and Social Empowerment (under which the National Child Protection Authority comes).
Moreover, the Committee addressed the necessity of educating about sexual and reproductive health in schools as the latter still remains limited and emphasised that the Ministry of Education and the Ministry of Health should collaboratively conduct programmes for school children who are largely unaware of crucial protection measures such as family planning.