Some children are viewing pornography on mobile phones when their parents go out “grogging”, says Medical Services Pacific (MSP) country director Ashna Shaleen.
She said children were now becoming perpetrators of sexual assault and having easy access to the internet could be a contributing factor.
“We have children abusing other children,” she said.
“A lot of research needs to be done on why this is happening. Fiji needs to know what are the root causes that lead to this.
“Is it access to pornography? Because it’s so accessible, you pay $3 and you are able to get access.
“One of my teams went out and a question was posed, ‘how many of you have seen pornography’ and these little ones were all lifting their hands up.
“And they were asked ‘when do you see it’ and they said it was when their parents were ‘grogging’, and they were left unsupervised.”
Ms Shaleen also said there needed to be more education on child protection and increased awareness on the good and bad touches.
“That needs to start off in school settings and in communities. This should be a concern for faith-based organisations because it’s everybody’s responsibility to raise a child.”
She said parents needed to have more interactive quality time with their children.
“I was looking at a TikTok that got out of how the parent has taken away phones so they can engage more with their child in play sessions. Parents need to come up with activities that are educational in nature and that is good for development.
“Nowadays, parents say that they are too busy, and they need self-care and time to be away from things, so they go out grogging and doing other things and that is fine but as long as parents know that their children are safe.”
