Nalini Singh is Director of the Fiji Women's Rights Movement. Photo: Supplied/FWRM
The Fiji Women's Rights Movement (FWRM) has called for stricter sentencing for multiple sexual offences.
The group found a discount was given by the courts for being a "first offender" in two our of three cases where the perpetrator committed multiple offences against the victim.
This figure applied to 108 cases before the High Court last year.
The Movement's Executive Director Nalini Singh said the message was clear.
"FWRM is of the view that for gendered crimes such as sexual violence (in the form of rape) towards female victims, there needs to be stricter safeguards by the formal criminal justice system in sending a strong message to the community," she said.
"The message should be - no discount for multiple offending."
She said global best practices are now moving away from giving discounts to serial offenders including rapists and Fiji should work towards the same.
In 70 percent of the cases, the victim knew the accused.
"A domestic violence restraining order was issued for only 32 percent of all the rape cases heard in court. These disturbing findings shows the worsening situation for sexual violence in Fiji," Singh said.
According to the annual statistics from the Office of the Director of Public Prosecutions for 2022, there were 322 people charged with a total of 768 counts of serious sexual offences.
There were 300 victims, of which 188 were under the age of 18.
"With 94 percent of victims of serious sexual crimes being women and girls, there is no doubt that sexual crimes are gendered in its offending, and therefore we can assuredly say that sexual crimes in Fiji are a form of gender-based violence.
"We need continuous gender sensitisation training to challenge harmful behaviour against women and girls," Nalini Singh said.