Campaign launched to criminalise marital rape (The Tribune)

Mar. 31, 2022 – The Tribune

Equality Bahamas co-director Lauren Glinton featured in The Tribune on March 31, 2022.

From The Tribune: 

EQUALITY Bahamas has announced the launch of its Strike5ive campaign to criminalise marital rape in the strongest, most explicit way.

According to a press release from the group, it calls on the government to criminalise marital rape by removing “who is not his spouse” from the definition of rape in Section 3 of the Sexual Offences Act, repealing Section 15 on sexual assault by a spouse, adding a statutory definition of consent to the Act, and including of a clause on non-immunity on the basis of a marital relationship.

There must be no temporal limitation and no requirement of the attorney general’s consent or any other barriers to reporting, the group said.

“Rape remains one of the most under reported crimes around the world. Criminalisation of marital rape and an improved reporting process will ensure that all women, regardless of their marital status, are protected by the law, able to report, and have access to justice,” said Lauren Glinton, Global 16 Days campaign coordinator at Equality Bahamas.

Equality Bahamas continues to call on the government to take action to come into compliance with international mechanisms — including Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW) and Belém do Pará which states that violence against women includes violence “that occurs within the family or domestic unit or within any other interpersonal relationship[…] including, among others, rape, battery and sexual abuse.”