Dar es Salaam. Some renowned Tanzania women’s rights activists have appealed to the government to drop its proposal that both the perpetrator and the victim of sextortion should face sexual corruption charges, noting that the proposition fails to consider the issue of power that is central to the crime.

The controversial motion is contained in the proposed amendments to the Prevention and Combating of Corruption Act that the Parliamentary Committee on Constitution and Legal Affairs has asked stakeholders to share their views on, among other seven pieces of legislation that the upcoming parliamentary sessions will debate.

The proposed amendments seek to add section 10(b) which replaces section 25 of the primary law of the PCCB Act concerning sexual and any other favours to prescribe a liability of a person who offers sexual favour or any other favours to a person in a position of power. The current act concerns only the person who demands sexual favours or any other favours.

The proposed sub-section reads: “[A person who] promises, gives, or offers sexual favour or any other favour to a person who is in a position of power or authority, to influence him to exercise his authority in his favour in giving employment, promotion, a right, privilege or any preferential treatment commits an offence and on conviction shall be liable to a fine of not less than two million shillings but not exceeding ten million shillings or to imprisonment for a term of not less than five years but not exceeding ten years or to both.”

Women’s rights activists say this section is unnecessary and dangerous, urging the government to scrap it from the proposed legislation. Speaking on Tuesday under the auspices of the Women Fund Tanzania Trust, which funds activist and feminist movements in the country, the activists believe the proposal is dangerous and counterproductive.

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“Sextortion is, fundamentally, an outcome of imbalanced power relations,” Prof Ruth Meena, a celebrated Tanzanian feminist activist and political scientist, said during a meeting in Dar es Salaam she co-organised to discuss the matter. “It is a consequence of misuse of power. How on earth, then, are we going to treat the perpetrator and the victim of this misuse of power the same?”

Dr Ave-Maria Semakafu, a long-time gender and feminist activist who has been vocal against sexual corruption, particularly in higher learning institutions, questioned the motivation behind the proposed amendments. She revealed during the meeting that, as far as she can tell, nobody has complained about the current reading of the law.

“We [activists] actually thought that if there were to be any amendments to the law, then they’d be about making the punishment against the perpetrators of sextortion harsher and stricter,” remarked Dr Semakafu, who once served as the permanent secretary in the ministry of water. “That’s essentially what we expected as we campaign to end these malpractices.”

Reports of sextortion, the short name for financially motivated sexual extortion, existing in many private and public institutions have been raised for some time now, leading Tanzania’s anti-corruption body PCCB to investigate them to inform public intervention better. PCCB investigated two public universities, the University of Dar es Salaam and the University of Dodoma.

On March 28, 2021, PCCB submitted its report to President Samia Suluhu Hassan, who, as the Head of State, urged the corruption watchdog to expand the scope of the investigation by looking at other universities. She also advised that PCCB can investigate other academic malpractices reported in the universities. The report is yet to be made public.

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Speaking on the proposed amendment, renowned Tanzanian playwright and intellectual Penina Mlama said she doesn’t see the logic behind it. She is appealing to the government to remove it from the bill as she fears that instead of solving the problem, it will make it far worse.

“It is going to make sextortion cases extremely difficult to prosecute as the perpetrators can easily invoke the section to shield themself against accountability,” Prof Mlama, a literary giant, analysed. “[The perpetrators] can easily escape justice by claiming that their victims offered them sexual bribes. When that happens, there’ll no longer be justice.”