EndGBV: Does your country recognize Marital Rape? #Orange
As we continue with the 16 days campaign, we need to talk about Intimate Partner Violence (IPV) which certainly is happening to more women than we think. The issue of marital rape continues to be contentious in many countries. The new Protection against Domestic Violence Act of Kenya 2015 includes "violence within marriage" as one of the forms of domestic violence. However the legislation only authorizes a victim to get protection order or damages but does not criminalize marital rape as a sexual offence.
The questions that often arise are: 1.Can consent to conjugal rights be withdrawn in a continuing marriage? 2. Can a plain unwanted sexual act within marriage be classified as marital rape or does it have to be accompanied by real violence? 3.How can marital rape be proved
It is the same in Mongolia. There is no a legal sanction for marital rape.
In Uganda, marital rape is not catered for in the laws of the country. This direly needs to be addressed.
Thank you Renu and Badejoko for the additions!
Hey Catherine,
Your very correct. Unfortunately, there is a very thin line between rape and sex, which is consent. I think the tendency to associate rape with violence is what makes it even more difficult in intimate partner relationships. Courts will presume that if a woman does not have bruises or medical evidence of injury, then she probably consented to the act. But they ignore how the act affects the woman psychologically and emotionally, leaving her feeling degraded and abused. Now since rape is a major offence carrying a big sentence, the burden of proof is very high and it becomes almost impossible for courts to rule on oral evidence of emotional distress. And the woman in the sexually abusive marriage has no remedy.
Hi Liz,
Can marital rape be proven? yes I tend to think, One can prove they were emotionally unprepared( emotionally distressed) and d it can also be proven biologically because upon medical extermination rape should be detected. On those two accounts, what do you think?
Hi Liz,
Can marital rape be proven? yes I tend to think, One can prove they were emotionally unprepared( emotionally distressed) and d it can also be proven biologically because upon medical extermination rape should be detected. On those two accounts, what do you think?
There is no special Act criminalizing marital rape in Nepal . As a result, only one provision in the Chapter on Rape of the Country Code deals with it. So far, only one reported case of marital rape is decided by the Supreme Court.The case registration rate is low in Nepal. The mens rea of marital rape is very difficult to be proven by the lawyers.
Marital rape is a controversial issue in Nigeria and there is a thin line between a woman's expected marital obligations and rights. Such rape is hidden under marital duties and is always arguably denied. Some men of a certain tribe perceive women or wives as properties they have paid for or acquired and believe such women answer to them with/without their consents.
"...The husband of a woman cannot himself be guilty of an actual rape upon his wife, on account of the matrimonial consent which she has given, and which she cannot retract..."
-Hale, "History of the Pleas of the Crown" (1786) p.629
Should this proposition remain or be extinguished in modern times as we uphold the right to dignity and social
protection above all?