The Lagos State Government has disclosed that 70 per cent of survivors of domestic violence do not have evidence to help build their cases.

The Executive Secretary of the Lagos State Domestic and Sexual Violence Agency, Titilola Vivour-Adeniyi, said this on Monday during a two-day training of state and police prosecutors on sexual and gender-based violence cases in Alausa, Ikeja.

Vivour-Adeniyi added that in the last 20 months, 11 women had lost their lives to domestic violence.

She said, “70 per cent of survivors of domestic violence don’t have actual data so we are saying that if it happens, take a picture, if there was someone around when it happened, let the person write a statement, go to the police station, go to the hospital and report exactly what transpired to the doctor or physician. All of these will help us to build the case of the survivor.

“We have over 4,000 cases and from these cases, 11 women have lost their lives in the last 20 months to domestic violence. We must engage the police on issues that pertain to sexual and gender-based violence. Let them know the relevant laws that exist, let them know their powers as provided in the law, and also let them know the support services that exist for survivors so they can make necessary referrals after they have done their bit during investigations.”

A trainer at the Ikeja Police Training School, Kenneth Okafor, said, “The essence of this training is to build the capacity of the officers to be able to properly handle cases of sexual and gender-based violence and this training is for us to have an effective performance from the police; we need to have this training from time to time.”