Gya: Chicken hawk with a plan

Several human rights groups have expressed outrage at the "exploitation" of a 13-year-old girl by city businessman Reeaz Khan noting how vulnerable low-income women and girls are to the abuse of privilege and influence by members of the rich and powerful elite."

The girl has been at the centre of a battle between her mother and Khan. The mother says that Khan took the child away, had sexual relations with her and did not want to return her to her mother's custody. Khan in turn has applied to the courts for permission to marry the 13-year-old.

The human rights groups are calling on the government to immediately enact legislation that would make the age of consent 16 years.

The statement was signed by Red Thread, Help & Shelter, the Guyana Association of Professional Social Workers, Women Across Differences, Guybernet, the Amerindian Action Movement of Guyana, the Guyanese Organisation of Indigenous Peoples', and the National Amerindian Development Foundation.
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Further, the groups noted that the central concern to them must be the protection of the child, whose age is not in dispute. They pointed out that at 13 she is without most legal rights.

"She does not have the right to vote, the right to drive, or the right to leave school. What an anomaly, therefore, that the law does not protect her against sexual exploitation by adult predators. Yet the Government of Guyana is signatory to the Convention of the Rights of the Child..."
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They issued a call to the government to immediately act on the recommendation of the Bernard Committee to raise the age of consent to 16 years for sexual relations with adults and urged the immediate implementation of mechanisms such as the Family Court and related child services to ensure the widest scope for child protection.
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Meanwhile Bibi Shameeza Hamid, the mother, yesterday continued the fight to have the child return home after she had fled on Saturday night from her aunt's home.
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According to Hamid she had first met Khan when she and her daughter were standing on the road awaiting transportation to go to Parika and he had stopped and offered them a lift. She said Khan had gone and shared out food to poor persons in the area and on their way back he stated that he had some vegetables to drop off in town adding that they should all go to dinner at a Chinese restaurant in the city. It was at that time some photographs were taken. Some of these photographs were carried in yesterday's edition of the Kaieteur News. One photograph showed Khan feeding the girl with a fork while the mother looked on. The woman said she thought Khan was a man of God and was behaving fatherly to her child.

She said that they spent the night at Khan's home on his insistence and the following morning he offered to have her child do `work-study' at his business place saying he would have returned her home the same afternoon. He never did and when the woman approached him he refused to return the child and after all efforts failed the woman said she gave up.

It was at this point Hamid said she attempted to commit suicide by drinking poison. This led to her being hospitalised. While in the hospital a public spirited citizen approached and after hearing her story assisted her to get a lawyer who moved to the High Court and filed habeas corpus proceedings which saw the child being produced in court and Justice BS Roy releasing her into the custody of her relatives. The child escaped from her relatives' home on Saturday and it is unclear where she is at the moment.