General News of Thursday, 19 April 2018
Source: Graphic.com.gh
2018-04-19
The girl was held down by two men while another flogged her
It has now emerged that the viral video in which a teenage girl was brutally assaulted by four macho men happened at Shishegu in the Sagnarigu Municipality of the Northern Region. The horrific video went viral last Sunday prompting calls by social media commentators for police investigations into the incident.
In the 1 minute 16 seconds video, male voices in Dagbani are heard accusing her of roaming unnecessarily and flirting around with men and thus bringing disgrace to the community.
She was stretched prostrate on a table and pinned down by two men whilst two other men subjected her to severe beaten with whips.
The helpless girl was dragged on the ground and beaten up mercilessly while a community of onlookers stood back to watch and record her ordeal.
Mr. Abdulai Naporo, the landlord of the house where the girl was mistreated has denied knowledge of the act.
He says though the girl together with her other sisters are his tenants, the incident happened in his absence because he lives in a different house.
According to him, he learned later that the chief of the area ordered the macho men to flog the girls on suspicion that they had turned the house into a brothel.
Meanwhile, the Northern Regional Coordinator for the Domestic Violence and Victims Support Unit (DOVVSU), Deputy Superintendent of Police (DSP), Mr. Emmanuel Horlutu has bemoaned the attitude of chiefs and opinion leaders covering up domestic violence cases.
He indicated that the incident had not been reported to his outfit although the video was making the rounds on social media and explained that, “It requires a formal complaint, medical evidence of the abuse, material evidence of the physical abuse to determine degree of correction and physical presence of victim to testify at prosecution in court”.