Every 20 hours, a child reports an incident of sexual abuse. That figure was made public last November by the Commissioner for the Protection of Children’s Rights, based on 438 reports recorded in 2024. A few days ago, the police released another figure: in 2025, there were 60 convictions in child sexual abuse cases.
“Behind every number is a case that was thoroughly investigated,” the statement said, adding that there is “systematic work, expertise and professionalism” from members of the Vulnerable Persons Case Management Sub-Directorate, with the aim of taking every case to the end. And indeed, the police, in cooperation with Hope For Children CRC Policy Center and the Children’s House, are doing exemplary work.
What so often comes along to wreck all that work — and hand impunity to abusers — is the delay in delivering justice. Trials drag on for years, often long enough for the child who suffered the abuse to become an adult. The video-recorded statement they gave as a minor at the Children’s House is no longer accepted as complete evidence once they come of age. The victim is called to appear in court and give evidence all over again — this time in front of the perpetrator.
The abused child is now a university student, a soldier, an employee. The trial does not arrive as the closing of a painful chapter, but as a fresh ordeal. Many children decide they cannot go through it again, and withdraw the charges. The effect of time on victims’ memory is another serious issue. Details become blurred, creating the risk that, in their new testimony, they fall into contradictions that will be seized upon by the defence, ultimately damaging the very delivery of justice itself.
We are also aware of the case of a girl who was abused by an adult from her own village. The perpetrator was released pending trial, and the girl is forced to live with the daily fear that she may run into him somewhere in the community, while everyone in the village already knows what happened. She no longer even wants to leave the house and is struggling to continue school. She is certainly not the only one.
Despite the modernisation of the law, despite greater social awareness, despite the support system provided by the police and services, delay in the courts comes along and flattens everything. Every case that drags on until the victim reaches adulthood turns the judicial process into a punishment for the child who broke their silence — just as awareness campaigns had urged them to do. And when that child finally gives in and withdraws the complaint, the system has not merely failed to deliver justice. It has helped the abuser get away with it.
