TV channel host stokes outrage with ‘rape demonstration’ on prime-time show

A TV channel in Ivory Coast has issued an apology and suspended for 30 days the host of a prime-time show who invited a convicted rapist to demonstrate on a mannequin how he assaulted his victims. The programme, broadcast on Monday by the private Nouvelle Chaine Ivorienne (NCI) channel, caused nationwide outrage and led to over 30,000 people signing an online petition seeking punishment for the channel and the show’s presenters. Host Yves de M’Bella was slammed for laughing while handing the man a mannequin and helping him lay it on the floor to explain how he chose his victims, and whether he preferred them “slim or fat”, Reuters reported.

ALSO READ: R Kelly accused of sexual exploitation by a man after similar testimonies by women

He then asked his guest to give women “advice” on to how to avoid getting raped. “Please tell me I’m dreaming,” Priss’K, an Ivorian rapper, wrote on Facebook. “It’s disgusting, unacceptable, disrespectful, especially towards women,” she wrote. “Rape is so degrading and dehumanising for the victim.”

ALSO READ: Mysuru gang-rape: Order banning girls’ movement in campus withdrawn

The petition urged the country’s media regulator and the ministries of communication and youth to cancel the show and sanction its presenting team, headed by Yves de M’Bella. NCI’s management apologised on Tuesday, saying it was committed “to respecting human rights and in particular those of women.” It also expressed “solidarity with women who are victims of violence and abuse of all kinds.”

ALSO READ: Ebola adding to West Africa’s COVID pressures, says WHO

Taking responsibility “for this serious and regrettable mistake”, NCI said De M’Bella had been suspended and vowed not to rebroadcast the episode in question.

“I’m sincerely sorry to have shocked everyone while trying to raise awareness,” de Mbella wrote on Facebook. “I made an error.”

“I’m also sorry for everything that was said or done during that sequence of the programme yesterday that hurt,” he wrote. “I beg for forgiveness from all victims of rape.”

In June, non-governmental organization CPDEFM, which campaigns for the rights of children, women and minorities, found that 416 women had been killed in the Abidjan city alone over the past two years.

It also identified 2,000 cases of violence against women, including 1,290 marriages of girls aged less than 18 and 1,121 rapes, according to Reuters.