Perceptions of and attitudes towards rehabilitation of victims of defilement in Zambia: Katete District as a case study

Abstract

This dissertation analyses the provision of rehabilitation services to victims of crime, since the enactment of the Anti-Gender Based Violence Act (Act number 1 of 2011) of the Laws of Zambia. As a career Public Prosecutor, the writer critically analyses the awareness and extent to which the legislative provision for rehabilitation services has been implemented by the Department of Social Welfare (DSW). He analyses the role of all other actors in complementing the statutory duty placed on the DSW and discuses pitfalls recorded in administrative structures. This work is gender neutral as the law on defilement provides that both boys and girls can be victims as such both sex are subject of rehabilitation. He effectively achieves this through the utilisation of his overall research methodology, the Women’s Law Approach (this has been used alongside other methods applicable to his research) and takes it to be the reference point constantly. The use of personal interrogation (as an actor in the Criminal Justice System), the grounded theory approach (which was built at every stage of the research), use of actors and structures (social workers both in Government Departments and Non-Governmental organisations, Journalists, Police Officers, Prosecutors, Magistrates, Educationalists, Administrators, and Politicians), observations(made from interviews conducted and the state of affairs on the ground), interviews, and documentary evidence (from legal documents and literature). Apart from difficulties arising from the fact that the Anti-Gender Based Violence Act is relatively new law, the writer finds that many gaps still exist between the aspirations set by the State in the Act and what is obtaining on the ground. Reliance on international instruments (to which Zambia ratified) is not the primary focus since rehabilitation of victims is created in the AGBV Act. He suggests filling the gaps between legislative provision and implementation by suggesting long term and short term measures.