PART 1
Sex – sexual contact between individuals involving penetration, especially the insertion of a man’s erect penis into a woman’s vagina, typically culminating in orgasm and the ejaculation of semen.
Extortion – the practice of obtaining something, especially money, through force or threats. (In this case its sex through withholding a service or creating unnecessary firewalls such that a service is unattainable by the general populas).
Hence, ((SEX+EXTORTION) =SEXTORTION)) = WOMENS’ RIGHTS VIOLATIONS.
According to Transparency International Zimbabwe, in the 2019 publication on Gender and Corruption in Zimbabwe, Sextortion is loosely defined as “abuse of power to obtain sexual benefit or advantage. Sex as opposed to money is used as a form of currency.” As opposed to popular perception, it is not only the illiterate and the downtrodden of the earth that are sextorted. Even the professional women that are well respected in fortune five hundred corporations are at the mercy of sextortionists.
This is more so because the professional woman is really not at liberty to go about along the office corridors publicising her predicament simply because she has so much to lose. Her reputation has taken forever to shape up in a patriarchal environment and cannot be weighed down by this one ‘little small incident.’
‘Actually, it really is not so bad and after all I am not the first neither will l be the last to undergo this disgusting craziness. Look around you girl, do you think you are the only one in this whole entire building who has suffered this predicament. Get it together and be strong there is so much more at stake here, we will not be derailed by this.’
This and many other sentiments are what goes through the heads of a million plus one woman who has been unfortunately robbed of an opportunity to receive a mere service without having to bend forwards and lean across some oak desk with her legs spread wide open in disdain while some egotistic, self-entitled man ‘conducts a barter trade’ set upon his Ts and Cs.
When humanness is slowly eroded by lack in various dimensions such as health, access to clean water and education just to mention the most pertinent in Zimbabwe corruption exacerbates as the people sitting on the giving end of services take advantage of those sitting on the receiving end. The Transparency International Corruption Perceptions Index (CIP) measures levels of corruption with 100 recording as very clean and 0 as very corrupt. In 2018, Zimbabwe recorded a very low score of 22 which pointed towards high levels of corruption in the public sector. And unfortunately, this is where most men sit on the giving end and women are stuck on the other side of the oak desk.
Birth certificates, identity documents and passports pure gold they have become and this has become one major driving factor cultivating sextortion simply because ‘I need to have my passport ready because akuhlaleki kulelilizwe.’ As a woman the caregiving role has never been more real as it is in this current Covid -19 era and the restrictions of travel have further derailed emancipation of women 20 steps backwards as they have to endure sextortion even in the bundu at the mercy of the infamous amagumaguma to help them cross over to the “promised land” where they are further sextorted for employment or they buy wares in bulk to come and resale in Zimbabwe
Women and girls are the most affected by sextortion not because they account for the largest proportion of people living in poverty but because ‘corruption exacerbates existing inequalities because of asymmetric power relations.’ On the other hand, men account for the greater number of sextorters because they are dominating in positions of leadership which gives them the upper hand to set terms and conditions of how and when one will receive basic services.
A survey conducted by TIZ proved that 57.5% of women viewed “sexual favour” as a non-monetary bribe that they had paid before. In Zimbabwe it is entrenched in the bribe culture and for those women without the Green Obama sex is just as good. Of the women surveyed, 15% attested to using sextortion and to them it has become ‘a small price to pay’ viz-a-viz the service required because many a times it is a matter of life and death situation that has so belittled the beautiful queens of our land to be pinned down in such a distasteful manner.
Sex is a currency in many corrupt deals in Zimbabwe. Sexual harassment is institutionalized, and women have been suffering for a long time. There is need to actively deal with all forms of sexual harassment in all sectors.
There never has been an urgent need as there is now to take section 17 of the Zimbabwean constitution seriously because it provides for gender balance, specifically full participation of women in all spheres; and taking legislative measures to ensure that both genders are equally represented in all institutions and that women constitute half of the membership of all Commissions and other elective and appointed government bodies. In essence this will reduce chances of sextortion by half as it is unlikely for another woman to ask for sex as payment from a fellow woman.
There is need to increase equitable participation of women in governance, public decision making and social accountability processes as this will ensure that women understand that service provision in public institution does not equate to ‘bending across the oak desk to appease the needs of one horny selfish chauvinistic pig.’ Zimbabwe Anti-Corruption Commission (ZACC), at what point do you suppose you will present your findings to the relevant body that SEXTORTION is real and it is a crime that one should be charged for? This I ask because women have to suffer in silence as no law has been put in place 42 years later to curb this cancer, thus one wonders if ever there is a committed effort in this direction or this is another one of patriarchy’s schemes to ensure that women ‘stay in their lane’ as most men would put it.
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